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SAINT    AUGUSTIN 


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SAINT    AUGUSTIN 


BY 

LOUIS    BERTRAND 


TRANSLATED    BT    VINCENT  O'SULLIVAN 


NEW   YORK 
D.   APPLETON    &    COMPANY 

MCMXIV 


J 


BR 


TRANSLATOR'S    NOTE 

THE  quotations  from  Saint  Augustin's  Confessions 
are  taken  from  Canon  Bigg's  scholarly  version, 
which  seems  to  me  the  best  in  English.  But  there 
are  places  where  M.  Bertrand's  reading  of  the  original 
text  differs  from  Dr.  Bigg's,  and  in  such  cases  I  have 
felt  myself  obliged  to  follow  the  author  of  this  book. 
These  differences  never  seriously  affect  the  meaning 
of  a  passage  ;  sometimes  it  is  a  mere  matter  of  choice, 
as  with  the  word  collactaneum  (i,  7)  which  Dr.  Bigg 
translates  "twin,"  and  M.  Bertrand,  like  ^Ms^y,  frere 
de  lait,  or  "foster-brother."  As  a  rule,  Dr.  Bigg 
chooses  the  quietest  terms,  and  M.  Bertrand  the  most 
forcible.  Those  curious  in  such  matters  may  like  to 
see  an  instance. 

gj         The  original  text  runs  : — 

z  .... 

^  Avulsa  a  latere  meo  tanquam  impedimento  conjugii,  cum 
qua  cubare  solitus  eram,  cor  ubi  adhaerebat,  concisum  et 
vulneratum  mihi  erat,  et  trahebat  sanguinem. 

uj  {Confessiones,  vi,  15.) 

^         M.  Bertrand  translates  : — 

^         Quand  on  arracha  de  mes   flancs,  sous    pretexte  qu'elle 

cj    empechait  mon   mariage,  celle  avec  qui  j'avais  coutume  de 

13    dormir,  depuis  si  longtemps,  la  ou  mon  coeur  etait  attache 

au  sien,  il  se  dechira,  et  je  trainais  mon  sang  avec  ma  blessure. 

Canon  Biaor's  version  is  : —  » 

My  mistress  was  torn  from  my  side  as  an  obstacle  to  my 
marriage,  and  my  heart,  which  clung  to  her,  was  torn  and 
wounded  till  it  bled. 


vi  SAINT   AUGUSTIN 

In  this  place,  it  will  be  observed  that  Dr.  Bigg 
does  not  emphasize  the  word  itbi,  which,  as  the  reader 
will  find  on  turning  to  page  185  of  this  volume, 
M.   Bertrand  thinks  so  significant. 

The  remaining  English  versions  of  the  writings  of 

Saint  Augustin  and  of  the  other  Latin  authors  quoted 

are  my  own,   except  the  passages  from   The  City  of 

God,  including  the  verse  translation  of  Persius,  which 

are  taken,  with  some  necessary  alterations,  from  the 

Seventeenth    century    translation    ascribed     to    John 

Healey. 

V.  O'S. 


CONTENTS 


CHAPTER 

Prologue 


PACK 
I 


THE   FIRST   PART 

DAYS   OF   CHILDHOOD 

I.  An  African  Free-town  Subject  to  Rome 
II.  The  Family  of  a  Saint     . 

III.  The  Comfort  of  the  Milk 

IV.  The  First  Games 
V.  The  Schoolboy  of  Madaura 

VI.  The  Holidays  at  Thagaste 


13 
18 

31 
39 
47 
62 


THE   SECOND   PART 
THE   ENCHANTMENT   OF   CARTHAGE 


I.  Carthago  Veneris 
II.  The  African  Rome 

III.  The  Carthage  Student 

IV.  The  Sweetness  of  Tears 
V.  The  Silence  of  God 


73 
79 
90 

105 


THE   THIRD    PART 

THE    RETURN 

I.  The  City  of  Gold 
II.  The  Final  Disillusion 

III.  The  Meeting  between  Ambrose  and  Augustin 

IV.  Plans  of  Marriage 

V.  The  Christ  in  the  Garden 

vii 


141 
153 

164 

175 

190 


viii  CONTENTS 

THE    FOURTH   PART 
THE   HIDDEN   LIFE 

CHAPTER  PACK 

I.  The  Last  Smile  of  the  Muse        .  .  .        -211 

IL  The  Ecstasy  of  Saint  Monnica     .  ...  228 

III.  The  Monk  of  Thagaste    .               .  ...  240 

IV.  Augustin  a  Priest             .              .  .           .        .  251 

THE   FIFTH   PART 

THE   APOSTLE   OF   PEACE   AND   OF   CATHOLIC   UNITY 

].  The  Bishop  of  Hippo         .              .  .           .        .  265 

II.  What  was  Heard  in  the  Basilica  of  Peace        .        .  282 

III.  The  Bishop's  Burthen                      .  ...  295 

IV.  Against  "The  Roaring  Lions"       .  ...  308 

THE   SIXTH   PART 

FACE   TO   PACE   WITH   THE   BARBARIANS 

I.  The  Sack  of  Rome             .               .  ...  2;^;^ 

II.  The  City  of  God                .              .  ...  345 

III.  The  Barbarian  Desolation            .  ...  360 

IV.  Saint  .Augustin    .              .              .  ...  381 

Index       .              .              .              .  •           •  3S9 


SAINT  AUGUSTIN 


PROLOGUE 

Inquietum  est  cor  nostrum  donee  requiescat  in  te. 
"Our  heart  finds  no  rest  until  it  rests  in  Thee." 

Confessions^  I,  i. 

SAINT  AUGUSTIN  is  now  little  more  than  a 
celebrated  name.  Outside  of  learned  or  theo- 
logical circles  people  no  longer  read  him.  Such  is 
true  renown  :  we  admire  the  saints,  as  we  do  great 
men,  on  trust.  Even  his  Confessions  are  generally 
spoken  of  only  from  hearsay.  By  this  neglect,  is  he 
atoning  for  the  renewal  of  glory  in  which  he  shone 
during  the  seventeenth  century,  w^hen  the  Jansenists, 
in  their  inveterate  obstinacy,  identified  him  with  the 
defence  of  their  cause  ?  The  reputation  of  sour 
austerity  and  of  argumentative  and  tiresome  pro- 
lixity which  attaches  to  the  remembrance  of  all  the 
writers  of  Port-Royal,  save  Pascal — has  that  affected 
too  the  work  of  Augustin,  enlisted  in  spite  of  himself 
in  the  ranks  of  these  pious  schismatics  ?  And  yet, 
if  there  have  ever  been  any  beings  who  do  not  re- 
semble Augustin,  and  whom  probably  he  would  have 
attacked  with  all  his  eloquence  and  all  the  force  of 
his  dialectic,  they  are  the  Jansenists.  Doubtless 
he  would  have  said  with  contempt  :    "  The  party  of 


2  SAINT   AUGUSTIN 

Jansen,"  even  as  in  his  own  day,  with  his  devo- 
tion to  Cathohc  unity,  he  said  :  "  The  party  of 
Donatus." 

It  must  be  acknowledged  also  that  the  very  sight 
of  his  works  is  terrifying,  whether  we  take  the 
enormous  folios  in  two  columns  of  the  Benedictine 
edition,  or  the  volumes,  almost  as  compact,  and 
much  more  numerous,  of  recent  editions.  Behind 
such  a  rampart  of  printed  matter  he  is  well  defended 
against  profane  curiosity.  It  needs  courage  and 
perseverance  to  penetrate  into  this  labyrinth  of 
text,  all  bristling  with  theology  and  exegesis  and 
metaphysics.  But  only  cross  the  threshold  of  the 
repellent  enclosure,  grow  used  to  the  order  and 
shape  of  the  building,  and  it  will  not  be  long  ere  you 
are  overcome  by  a  warm  sympathy,  and  then  by  a 
steadily  increasing  admiration  for  the  host  who  dwells 
there.  The  hieratic  face  of  the  old  bishop  lights  up, 
becomes  strangely  living,  almost  modern,  in  ex- 
pression. You  discover  under  the  text  one  of  the 
most  passionate  lives,  most  busy  and  richest  in 
instruction,  that  history  has  to  shew.  What  it 
teaches  is  applicable  to  ourselves,  answers  to  our 
interests  of  yesterday  and  to-day.  This  existence, 
and  the  century  in  which  it  was  passed,  recall  our 
own  century  and  ourselves.  The  return  of  similar 
circumstances  has  brought  similar  situations  and 
characters  ;  it  is  almost  our  portrait.  And  we  feel 
half  ready  to  conclude  that  at  the  present  moment 
there  is  no  subject  more  actual  than  St.  Augustin. 

At  least  he  is  one  of  the  most  interesting.  What, 
indeed,  is  more  romantic  than  this  wandering  hfe  of 
rhetorician  and  student  that  the  youthful  Augustin 
led,  from  Thagaste  to  Carthage,  from  Carthage  to 


PROLOGUE  3 

Milan  and  to  Rome — begun  in  the  pleasures  and 
tumult  of  great  cities,  and  ending  in  the  penitence, 
the  silence,  and  recollection  of  a  monastery  ?  And 
again,  what  drama  is  more  full  of  colour  and  more 
profitable  to  consider  than  that  last  agony  of  the 
Empire,  of  which  Augustin  was  a  spectator,  and, 
with  all  his  heart  faithful  to  Rome,  would  have  pre- 
vented if  he  could  ?  And  then,  what  tragedy  more 
stirring  and  painful  than  the  crisis  of  soul  and  con- 
science which  tore  his  life  ?  Well  may  it  be  said  that, 
regarded  as  a  whole,  the  life  of  Augustin  was  but  a 
continual  spiritual  struggle,  a  battle  of  the  soul. 
It  is  the  battle  of  every  moment,  the  never-ceasing 
combat  of  body  and  spirit,  which  the  poets  of  that 
time  dramatized,  and  which  is  the  history  of  the 
Christian  of  all  times.  The  stake  of  the  battle  is  a 
soul.  The  upshot  is  the  final  triumph,  the  redemp- 
tion of  a  soul. 

What  makes  the  life  of  Augustin  so  complete  and 
so  truly  typical  is  that  he  fought  the  good  fight,  not 
only  against  himself,  but  against  all  the  enemies  of 
the  Church  and  the  Empire.  If  he  was  a  doctor 
and  a  saint,  so  was  he  too  the  type  of  the  man  of 
action  in  one  of  the  most  disheartened  periods.  That 
he  triumphed  over  his  passions — this,  in  truth, 
concerns  only  God  and  himself.  That  he  preached, 
wrote,  shook  crowds,  disturbed  minds,  may  seem 
without  importance  to  those  who  reject  his  doctrine. 
But  that  across  the  centuries  his  soul,  afire  with 
charity,  continues  to  warm  our  own  ;  that  without 
our  knowledge  he  still  shapes  us  ;  and  that,  in  a  way 
more  or  less  remote,  he  is  still  the  master  of  our 
hearts,  and,  in  certain  aspects,  of  our  minds — 
there  is  what  touches  each  and  all  of  us,  without  dis- 


4  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

tinction.  Not  only  has  Augustin  always  his  great 
place  in  the  living  communion  of  all  christened 
people,  but  the  Western  soul  is  marked  with  the 
stamp  of  his  soul. 

First  of  all,  his  fate  is  confused  with  that  of  the 
dying  Empire.  He  witnessed,  if  not  the  utter  dis- 
appearance, at  least  the  gradual  swooning  away  of 
that  admirable  thing  called  the  Roman  Empire, 
image  of  Catholic  unity.  Well,  we  are  the  wreckage 
of  the  Empire.  Usuall}^  we  turn  away  with  con- 
tempt from  those  wretched  centuries  which  under- 
went the  descents  of  the  Barbarians.  For  us,  that 
is  the  Lower- Empire,  a  time  of  shameful  decadence 
which  deserves  nothing  but  our  scorn.  However, 
it  is  out  of  this  chaos  and  this  degradation  that 
we  have  arisen.  The  wars  of  the  Roman  republic 
concern  us  less  than  the  outlawry  of  the  Barbarian 
chiefs  who  separated  our  Gaul  from  the  Empire, 
and  without  knowing  it,  prepared  the  dawn  of  France. 
After  all,  what  are  the  rivalries  of  Marius  and  Sylla 
to  us  ?  The  victory  of  Aetius  over  the  Huns  in  the 
plains  of  Chalons  concerns  us  a  good  deal  more. 
Further,  it  is  unfair  to  the  Lower-Empire  to  view 
it  only  as  a  time  of  feebleness  and  cowardice  and 
corruption.  It  was  also  an  epoch  of  immense  activity, 
prolific  of  daring  and  high-flying  adventurers,  some 
of  them  heroic.  Even  the  most  degenerate  of  the 
last  Emperors  never  lost  the  conviction  of  Roman 
majesty  and  grandeur.  Unto  the  very  end,  they 
employed  all  the  ruses  of  their  diplomacy  to  prevent 
the  Barbarian  chiefs  from  imagining  themselves 
anything  else  but  vassals  of  the  Empire.  Honorius, 
at  bay  in  Ravenna,  persisted  in  refusing  Alaric 
the  title  of  commander  of  the  Cohortes  UrbancB,  even 


PROLOGUE  5 

though  his  refusal  were  to  lead  to  the  sack  of  Rome 
and  imperil  his  own  life. 

Simply  by  his  fidelity  to  the  Empire,  Augustin 
shews  himself  one  like  ourselves — a  Latin  of  Occi- 
tania.  But  still  closer  resemblances  draw  him  near 
to  us.  His  time  was  very  like  our  own  time.  Upon 
even  a  slight  familiarity  with  his  books  we  recognize 
in  him  a  brother-soul  who  has  suffered,  felt,  thought, 
pretty  nearly  like  us.  He  came  into  an  ending  world, 
on  the  eve  of  the  great  cataclysm  which  was  going 
to  carry  away  an  entire  civilization — a  tragic  turning- 
point  of  history,  a  time  troubled  and  often  very 
grievous,  which  was  hard  to  live  in  for  all,  and  to 
even  the  most  determined  minds  must  have  appeared 
desperate.  The  peace  of  the  Church  was  not  yet 
settled  ;  consciences  were  divided.  People  hesitated 
between  the  belief  of  yesterday  and  the  belief  of  to- 
morrow. Augustin  was  among  those  who  had  the 
courage  to  choose,  and  who,  having  once  chosen  their 
faith,  proclaimed  it  without  weakening.  The  belief 
of  a  thousand  years  was  dying  out,  quenched  by  a 
young  belief  to  which  was  promised  an  eternal  dura- 
tion. How  manv  delicate  souls  must  have  suffered 
from  this  division,  which  cut  them  off  from  their 
traditions  and  obliged  them,  as  they  thought,  to  be 
false  to  their  dead  along  with  the  religion  of  their 
ancestors  !  All  the  irritations  which  the  fanatics  of 
to-day  inflict  upon  believing  souls,  many  must  have 
had  to  suffer  then.  The  sceptics  were  infused  by  the 
intolerance  of  the  others.  But  the  worst  (even  as  ^ 
it  is  to-day)  was  to  watch  the  torrent  of  foolishness 
which,  under  cover  of  religion,  philosophy,  or 
miracle-working,  pretended  to  the  conquest  of  mind 
and  will.     Amid  this  mass  of  wildest  doctrines  and 


6  SAINT   AUGUSTIN 

heresies,  in  this  orgy  of  vapid  intellectuaUsm,  they 
had  indeed  sohd  heads  who  were  able  to  resist  the 
general  intoxication.  And  among  all  these  people 
talking  nonsense,  Augustin  appears  admirable  with 
his  good  sense. 

This  "  intellectual,"  this  mystic,  was  not  only  a 
man  of  prayer  and  meditation.  The  prudence  of  the 
man  of  action  and  the  administrator  balanced  his  out- 
bursts of  dialectical  subtilit}^  often  carried  too  far. 
He  had  that  sense  of  realities  such  as  we  flatter  our- 
selves that  we  have  ;  he  had  a  knowledge  of  life 
and  passion.  Compared  to  the  experience  of,  say, 
Bossuet,  how  much  wider  was  Augustin's  !  And  with 
all  that,  a  quivering  sensitiveness  which  is  again  like 
our  own — the  sensitiveness  of  times  of  intense 
culture,  wherein  the  abuse  of  thought  has  multiplied 
the  ways  of  suffering  in  exasperating  the  desire  for 
pleasure.  "  The  soul  of  antiquity  was  rude  and 
vain."  It  was,  above  all,  limited.  The  soul  of 
Augustin  is  tender  and  serious,  eager  for  certainties 
and  those  enjoyments  which  do  not  betray.  It  is 
vast  and  sonorous  ;  let  it  be  stirred  ever  so  little, 
and  from  it  go  forth  deep  vibrations  which  render 
the  sound  of  the  infinite.  Augustin,  before  his 
conversion,  had  the  apprehensions  of  our  Romantics, 
the  causeless  melancholy  and  sadness,  the  immense 
yearnings  for  "  anywhere  but  here,"  which  over- 
whelmed our  fathers.    He  is  really  very  close  to  us. 

He  has  broadened  our  Latin  souls  by  reconciling  us 
with  the  Barbarian.  The  Latin,  like  the  Greek,  only 
understood  himself.  The  Barbarian  had  not  the 
right  to  express  himself  in  the  language  of  the  Empire. 
The  world  was  split  into  two  parts  which  endeavoured 
to  ignore  each  other.     Augustin  has  made  us  con- 


PROLOGUE  7 

scious  of  the  nameless  regions,  the  vague  countries 
of  the  soul,  which  hitherto  had  lain  shrouded  in  the 
darkness  of  barbarism.  By  him  the  union  of  the 
Semitic  and  the  Occidental  genius  is  consummated. 
He  has  acted  as  our  interpreter  for  the  Bible.  The 
harsh  Hebraic  words  become  soft  to  our  ears  by 
their  passage  through  the  cultivated  mouth  of  the 
rhetorician.  He  has  subjugated  us  with  the  word 
of  God.  He  is  a  Latin  who  speaks  to  us  of 
Jehovah. 

Others,  no  doubt,  had  done  it  before  him.  But 
none  had  found  a  similar  emotion,  a  note  of  tender- 
ness so  moving.  The  gentle  violence  of  his  charity 
wins  the  adherence  of  hearts.  He  breathes  only 
charity.  After  St.  John,  it  is  he  who  is  the  Apostle 
of  Love. 

His  tireless  voice  dominated  the  whole  of  the  West. 
The  Middle  Ages  still  heard  it.  For  centuries  his 
sermons  and  treatises  were  copied  over  and  over 
again  ;  they  were  repeated  in  cathedrals,  commented 
in  abstracts  of  theology.  People  came  to  accept  even 
his  theory  of  the  fine  arts.  All  that  we  have  inherited 
from  the  ancients  reaches  us  through  Augustin. 
He  is  the  great  teacher.  In  his  hands  the  doctrinal 
demonstration  of  the  Catholic  religion  takes  firm 
shape.  To  indicate  the  three  great  stages  of  the 
onward  march  of  the  truth,  one  may  say  :  Jesus 
Christ,  St.  Paul,  St.  Augustin.  Nearest  to  our 
weakness  is  the  last.  He  is  truly  our  spiritual  father. 
He  has  taught  us  the  language  of  prayer.  The 
words  of  Augustin's  prayers  are  still  upon  the  lips 
of  the  devout. 

This  universal  genius,  who  during  forty  years 
was    the    speaking-trumpet    of    Christendom,    was 


8  SAINT   AUGUSTIN 

also  the  man  of  one  special  century  and  country. 
Augustin  of  Thagaste  is  the  great  African, 

Well  may  we  be  proud  of  him  and  adopt  him  as 
one  of  our  glories — we  who  have  kept  up,  for  now 
almost  a  century,  a  struggle  like  to  that  which  he 
maintained  for  the  unity  of  the  Roman  Empire,  we 
who  consider  Africa  as  an  extension  of  France.  More 
than  any  other  writer,  he  has  expressed  the  tempera- 
ment and  the  genius  of  his  country.  This  motley 
Africa,  with  its  eternal  mixture  of  races  at  odds  with 
one  another,  its  jealous  sectarianism,  the  variety 
of  its  scenery  and  climate,  the  violence  of  its  sensa- 
tions and  passions,  its  seriousness  of  character  and 
its  quick-changing  humour,  its  mind  at  once  practical 
and  frivolous,  its  materialism  and  its  mysticism,  its 
austerity  and  its  luxury,  its  resignation  to  servitude 
and  its  instincts  of  independence,  its  hunger  to  rule — 
all  that  comes  out  with  singularly  vivid  touches  in 
the  work  of  Augustin.  Not  only  was  he  his  country's 
voice,  but,  as  far  as  he  could,  he  realized  its  old 
dream  of  dominion.  The  supremacy  in  spiritual 
matters  that  Carthage  disputed  so  long  and  bitterly 
with  Rome,  it  ended  by  obtaining,  thanks  to 
Augustin.  As  long  as  he  lived,  the  African  Church 
was  the  mistress  of  the  Churches  of  the  West. 

As  for  me — if  I  ma}^  venture  to  refer  to  myself  in 
such  a  matter — I  have  had  the  joy  to  recognize  in 
him,  besides  the  Saint  and  Teacher  whom  I  revere, 
the  ideal  type  of  the  Latin  of  Africa.  The  image  of 
which  I  descried  the  outline  long  ago  through  the 
mirages  of  the  South  in  following  the  waggons  of  my 
rugged  heroes,  I  have  seen  at  last  become  definite, 
grow  clear,  wax  noble  and  increase  to  the  very 
heaven,  in  following  the  traces  of  Augustin. 


PROLOGUE  9 

And  even  supposing  that  the  Ufe  of  this  child  of 
Thagaste,  the  son  of  Monnica,  were  not  intermingled 
so  deeply  with  ours,  though  he  were  for  us  only  a 
foreigner  born  in  a  far-off  land,  nevertheless  he  would 
still  remain  one  of  the  most  fascinating  and  luminous 
souls  who  have  shone  amid  our  darkness  and  warmed 
our  sadness — one  of  the  most  human  and  most 
divine  creatures  who  have  trod  our  highways. 


THE   FIRST   PART 
DAYS   OF   CHILDHOOD 


Sed  delectabat  ludere. 
"  Only,  I  liked  to  play." 

Confessions^  I,  9. 


AN    AFRICAN    FREE-TOWN    SUBJECT   TO    ROME 

ITTLE  streets,  quite  white,  which  dimb  up  to  ^  ^, 
clay-formed    hills    deeply    furrowed    by    the  '^'' 


E 


iL^f 


heavy  winter  rains  ;  between  the  double  row  of 
houses,  brilhant  in  the  morning  sun,  ghmpses  of  sky 
of  a  very  tender  blue  ;  here  and  there,  in  the  strip 
of  deep  shade  which  lies  along  the  thresholds,  white 
figures  crouched  upon  rush-mats — indolent  outlines, 
draped  with  bright  colours,  or  muffled  in  rough  and 
sombre  wool-stuffs ;  a  horseman  who  passes,  bent 
almost  in  two  in  his  saddle,  the  big  hat  of  the  South 
flung  back  over  his  shoulders,  and  encouraging  with 
his  heel  the  graceful  trot  of  his  horse — such  is  Tha- 
gaste  as  we  see  it  to-day,  and  such  undoubtedly  it 
appeared  to  the  traveller  in  the  days  of  Augustin. 

Like  the  French  town  built  upon  its  ruins,  the 
African  free-city  lay  in  a  sort  of  plain  taken  between 
three  round  hills.  One  of  them,  the  highest  one, 
which  is  now  protected  by  a  bordj,  must  have  been 
defended  in  old  days  by  a  castellum.  Full-flowing  | 
waters  moisten  the  land.  To  those  coming  from  the 
stony  regions  about  Constantine  and  Setif,  or  the 
vast  bare  plain  of  the  Medjerda,  Thagaste  gives  an 
impression  of  freshness  and  cool.  It  is  a  laughing 
place,  full  of  greenery  and  running  water.  To  the 
Africans  it  offers  a  picture  of  those  northern  coun- 
tries which  they  have  never  seen,  with  its  wooded 

13 


14  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

mountains  covered  by  pines  and  cork  trees  and  ilex. 
It  presents  itself  as  a  land  of  mountain  and  forest — 
especially  forest.  It  is  a  hunter's  country.  Game  is 
plentiful  there — boar,  hare,  redwing,  quail,  part- 
ridge. In  Augustin's  time,  wild  beasts  were  appa- 
rently more  numerous  in  the  district  than  they  are 
to-day.  When  he  compares  his  adversaries,  the 
Donatists,  to  roaring  lions,  he  speaks  like  a  man  who 
knows  what  a  lion  is. 

To  the  east  and  west,  wide  stretches  of  woodland, 
rounded  hill-summits,  streams  and  torrents  which 
pour  through  the  valleys  and  glens — there  you  have 
Thagaste  and  the  country  round  about — the  world, 
in  fact,  as  it  revealed  itself  to  the  eyes  of  the  child 
Augustin.  But  towards  the  south  the  verdure 
grows  sparse  ;  arid  mountain-tops  appear,  crushed 
down  as  blunted  cones,  or  jutted  in  slim  Tables  of 
the  Law;  the  sterility  of  the  desert  becomes  per- 
ceptible amid  the  wealth  of  vegetation.  This  full- 
foliaged  land  has  its  harsh  and  stern  localities.  The 
African  light,  however,  softens  all  that.  The  deep 
green  of  the  oaks  and  pines  runs  into  waves  of  warm 
and  ever-altering  tints  which  are  a  caress  and  a  de- 
light for  the  eye.  A  man  has  it  thoroughly  brought 
home  to  him  that  he  is  in  a  land  of  the  sun. 

To  say  the  least,  it  is  a  country  of  strongly  marked 
features  which  affords  the  strangest  contrast  with 
the  surrounding  districts.  This  wooded  Numidia, 
with  its  flowing  brooks,  its  fields  where  the  cattle 
graze,  differs  in  the  highest  degree  from  the  Numidia 
towards  Setif — a  wide,  desolate  plain,  where  the 
stubble  of  the  wheat-fields,  the  sandy  steppes,  roll 
away  in  monotonous  undulations  to  the  cloudy  bar- 
rier of  Mount  Atlas  which  closes  the  horizon.     And 


AN   AFRICAN   FREE-TOWN  15 

this  rough  and  melancholy  plain  in  its  turn  offers  a 
striking  contrast  with  the  coast  region  of  Boujeiah 
and  Hippo,  which  is  not  unlike  the  Italian  Campania 
in  its  mellowness  and  gaiety.  Such  clear-cut  differ- 
ences between  the  various  parts  of  the  same  province 
doubtless  explain  the  essential  peculiarities  of  the 
Numidian  character.  The  bishop  Augustin,  who 
carried  his  pastoral  cross  from  one  end  to  the  other 
of  this  country,  and  was  its  acting  and  thinking  soul, 
may  perhaps  have  owed  to  it  the  contrasts  and 
many-sidedness  of  his  own  rich  nature. 

Of   course,   Thagaste  did   not   pretend   to   be   a 
capital.     It  was  a  free-town  of  the  second  or  third 
order  ;   but  its  distance  from  the  great  centres  gave 
it  a   certain   importance.     The   neighbouring   free- 
towns,  Thubursicum,  Thagura,  were  small.  Madaura 
and  Theveste,  rather  larger,  had  not  perhaps  the 
same  commercial  importance.    Thagaste  was  placed 
at  the  junction  of  many  Roman  roads.     There  the  j 
little  Augustin,  with  other  children  of  his  age,  would  \ 
have  a  chance  to  admire  the  out-riders  and  equipages  i 
of  the  Imperial  Mail,  halted  before  the  inns  of  the  | 
town.  What  we  can  be  sure  of  is  that  Thagaste,  then 
as  now,  was  a  town  of  passage  and  of  traffic,  a  half- 
way stopping-place  for  the  southern  and  coast  towns, 
as  well  as  for  those  of  the  Proconsulate  and  Numidia. 
And  like  the  present  Souk-Ahras,  Thagaste  must 
have  been  above  all  a  market.     Bread-stuffs  and! 
Numidian  wines  were  bartered  for  the  flocks  of  the ! 
Aures,  leather,  dates,  and  the  esparto  basket-work 
of  the  regions  of  Sahara.    The  marbles  of  Simitthu, 
the  citron-wood  of  which  they  made  precious  tables, 
were  doubtless  handled  there.     The  neighbouring 
forests  could  furnish  building  materials  to  the  whole 


i6  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

country.  Thagaste  was  the  great  mart  of  woodland 
Numidia,  the  warehouse  and  the  bazaar,  where  to 
this  day  the  nomad  comes  to  lay  in  a  stock  of  pro- 
visions, and  stares  with  childish  delight  at  the  fine 
things  produced  by  the  inventive  talent  of  the 
I    workers  who  live  in  towns. 

Thus  images  of  plenty  and  joy  surrounded  the 
cradle  of  Augustin.  The  smile  of  Latin  beauty 
welcomed  him  also  from  his  earliest  steps.  It  is  true 
that  Thagaste  was  not  what  is  called  a  fine  city.  The 
fragments  of  antiquity  which  have  been  unearthed 
there  are  of  rather  inferior  workmanship.  But  how 
little  is  needed  to  give  wings  to  the  imagination 
of  an  intelligent  child  !  At  all  events,  Thagaste 
had  a  bathing-hall  paved  with  mosaics  and  per- 
haps ornamented  with  statues  ;  Augustin  used  to 
bathe  there  with  his  father.  And  again,  it  is 
probable  that,  like  the  neighbouring  Thubursicum 
and  other  free-cities  of  the  same  level,  it  had  its 
theatre,  its  forum,  its,  nymph-fountains,  perhaps 
even  its  amphitheatre.  Of  all  that  nothing  has  been 
found.  Certain  inscribed  stone  tablets,  capitals  and 
shafts  of  columns,  a  stone  with  an  inscription 
which  belonged  to  a  Catholic  church — that  is  all 
which  has  been  discovered  up  to  this  present 
time. 

Let  us  not  ask  for  the  impossible.  Thagaste  had 
columns — nay,  perhaps  a  whole  street  between  a 
double  range  of  columns,  as  at  Thimgad.  That 
would  be  quite  enough  to  delight  the  eyes  of  a  little 
wondering  boy.  A  column,  even  injured,  or  scarcely 
cleansed  from  wrack  and  rubbish,  has  about  it 
something  impressive.  It  is  like  a  free  melody 
singing  among  the  heavy  masses  of  the  building. 


AN   AFRICAN   FREE-TOWN  17 

To  this  hour,  in  our  Algerian  villages,  the  mere  sight 
of  a  broken  column  entrances  and  cheers  us — a  white 
ghost  of  beauty  streaming  up  from  the  ruins  among 
the  modern  hovels. 

There  were  columns  at  Thagaste. 


I 


II 

THE    FAMILY   OF   A   SAINT 

T  was  in  this  pleasant  little  town,  shaded  and 
beautified  for  many  years  now  b}^  the  arts  of 
Rome,  that  the  parents  of  Augustin  lived. 
M"^  His  father,  Patricius,  affords  us  a  good  enough 

type  of  the  Romanized  African.  He  belonged  to 
the  order  of  Decuriones,  to  the  "  ver}'  brilliant 
urban  council  of  Thagaste  "  {splendidissimus  or  do 
Thagastensis) ,  as  an  inscription  at  Souk-Ahras  puts 
it.  Although  these  strong  epithets  may  be  said  to 
be  part  of  the  ordinary  official  phraseology,  they 
indicate,  just  the  same,  the  importance  which  went 
with  such  a  position.  In  his  township,  Patricius 
was  a  kind  of  personage.  His  son  assures  us  that  he 
was  poor,  but  we  may  suspect  the  holy  bishop  of 
exaggerating  through  Christian  humility.  Patricius 
must  certainly  have  owned  more  than  twenty-five 
acres  of  land,  for  this  was  made  a  condition  of  being 
elected  to  the  cttria.  He  had  vineyards  and  orchards, 
of  which  Augustin  later  on  recalled  the  plentiful 
and  sweet-tasting  fruits.  In  short,  he  lived  in  con- 
siderable style.  It  is  true  that  in  Africa  household 
expenses  have  never  at  any  time  been  a  great 
extravagance.  Still,  the  sons  of  Patricius  had  a 
pedagogue,  a  slave  specially  engaged  to  keep  them 
\  under  his  eye,  like  all  the  children  of  families 
'  comfortablv  off. 


THE  FAMILY  OF  A  SAINT  19 

It  has  been  said  that  as  Augustin's  father  was  a 
member  of  the  curia,  he  must  have  been  a  ruined 
man.  The  Decurions,  who  levied  taxes  and  made  \ 
themselves  responsible  for  their  collection,  were 
obliged  to  supply  any  deficiency  in  the  revenue  out 
of  their  own  money.  Patricius,  it  is  thought,  must 
have  been  one  of  the  numerous  victims  of  this 
disastrous  system.  But  no  doubt  there  were  a 
good  many  exceptions.  Besides,  there  is  nothing 
in  Augustin's  reminiscences  which  authorizes  us  to 
believe  that  his  father  ever  knew  embarrassment, 
to  say  nothing  of  actual  poverty.  What  seems  by 
far  the  most  probable  is  that  he  lived  as  well  as  he 
could  upon  the  income  of  his  estate  as  a  small 
country  landowner.  In  Africa  people  are  satisfied 
with  very  little./  Save  for  an  unusually  bad  year 
following  a  time  of  long  drought,  or  a  descent  of 
locusts,  the  land  always  gives  forth  enough  to  feed 
its  master. 

To  hunt,  to  ride  horseback,  now  and  then  to  go 
on  parade,  to  look  after  his  small-holders  and 
agricultural  slaves,  to  drive  one  of  those  bargains 
in  which  African  cunning  triumphs — such  were 
the  employments  of  Patricius.  In  short,  he  drifted 
through  life  on  his  little  demesne.  Sometimes  this 
indolent  man  was  overcome  by  a  sudden  passion  for 
work  ;  or  again  he  was  seized  by  furious  rages.  He 
was  violent  and  brutal.  At  such  moments  he 
struck  out  right  and  left.  He  would  even  have  hit 
his  wife  or  flogged  the  skin  off  her  back  if  the 
quietude  of  this  woman,  her  dignity  and  Christian 
mildness,  had  not  overawed  him.  Let  us  not  judge 
this  kind  of  conduct  by  our  own  ;  we  shall  never 
understand   it.      The    ancient    customs,    especially 


20  SAINT   AUGUSTIN 

the  African  customs,  were  a  disconcerting  mixture 
of  intense  refinement  and  heedless  brutality. 

That  is  why  it  will  not  do  to  exaggerate  the  out- 
bursts of  Patricius,  which  his  son  mentions  discreetly. 
Although  he  may  not  have  been  very  faithful  to  his 
wife,  that  was  in  those  daj^s,  more  than  in  ours,  a 
venial  sin  in  the  eyes  of  the  world.  At  heart  the 
African  has  always  longed  for  a  harem  in  his  house  ; 
he  inclines  naturally  to  the  polygamy  of  Muslemism. 
In  Carthage,  and  elsewhere,  public  opinion  was  full 
of  indulgence  for  the  husband  who  allowed  himself 
liberties  with  the  serving-w^omen.  People  laughed 
at  it,  and  excused  the  man.  It  is  true  they  were 
rather  harder  on  the  matron  who  took  the  same 
kind  of  liberty  with  her  men-slaves.  However,  that 
went  on  too.  The  Bishop  of  Hippo,  in  his  sermons, 
strongly  rebuked  the  Christian  married  couples  for 
these  frequent  adulteries  which  were  scarcely  re- 
garded as  errors. 

Patricius  was  a  pagan,  and  this  partly  explains 
his  laxit}^  It  would  doubtless  be  going  too  far  to 
say  that  he  remained  faithful  to  paganism  all  his 
life.  It  is  not  likely  that  this  urban  councillor  of 
Thagaste  was  a  particularly  assured  pagan.  Specula- 
tive and  intellectual  considerations  made  a  very 
moderate  appeal  to  him.  He  was  not  an  arguer  like 
his  son.  He  was  pagan  from  habit,  from  that 
instinctive  conservatism  of  the  citizen  and  land- 
owner who  sticks  obstinately  to  his  class  and 
family  traditions.  Prudence  and  diplomacy  had 
also  something  to  do  with  it.  Many  great  land- 
lords continued  to  defend  and  practise  paganism, 
probably  from  motives  similar  to  those  of  Patricius 
himself.    As  for  him,  he  had  no  desire  to  get  wrong 


THE   FAMILY   OF  A  SAINT  21 

with  the  important  and  influential  people  of  the 
country  ;  he  might  have  need  of  their  protection 
to  save  his  small  property  from  the  ravenous  public 
treasury.  Moreover,  the  best-paid  posts  were  still 
controlled  by  the  pagan  priesthood.  And  so 
Augustin's  father  thought  himself  very  wis6  in 
dealing  cautiously  with  a  religion  which  was  always 
so  powerful,  and  rewarded  its  adherents  so  well. 

But  for  all  that,  it  is  undeniable  that  paganism 
about  this  time  was  in  an  awkward  position  from 
a  political  point  of  view.  The  Government  eyed  it 
with  disapproval.  Since  the  death  of  Constantine, 
the  "  accursed  emperors  "  had  waged  against  it  a 
furious  war.  In  353,  just  before  the  birth  of 
Augustin,  Constantius  promulgated  an  edict  renew- 
ing the  order  for  the  closing  of  the  temples  and  the 
abolition  of  sacrifices — and  that  too  under  pain  of 
death  and  confiscation.  But  in  distant  provinces, 
such  as  Numidia,  the  action  of  the  central  power 
was  slow  and  irregular.  It  was  often  represented 
by  officials  who  were  hostile  or  indifferent  to  Chris- 
tianity. The  local  aristocracy  and  their  following 
scoffed  at  it  more  or  less  openly.  In  their  immense 
villas,  behind  the  walls  of  their  parks,  the  rich 
landowners  offered  sacrifices  and  organized  pro- 
cessions and  feasts  as  if  there  were  no  law  at  all. 
Patricius  knew  all  that.  And,  on  the  other  side, 
he  could  take  note  of  the  encroachments  of  the  new 
religion.  During  the  first  half  of  the  fourth  century 
Thagaste  had  been  conquered  by  the  Donatists. 
Since  the  edict  of  Constans  against  these  schismatics, 
the  inhabitants  of  the  little  city  had  come  back  to 
Catholicism  out  of  fear  of  the  severity  of  the 
imperial  government.     But  the  settlement  was  far 


22  SAINT   AUGUSTIN 

from  being  complete  and  final.  As  a  consequence 
of  the  edict,  the  whole  region  of  the  Aures  had  been 
in  revolution.  The  Bishop  of  Bagai,  fortified  in 
his  episcopal  city  and  basilica,  had  stood  an  actual 
siege  from  the  Roman  troops.  Almost  everywhere 
the  struggle  between  Donatists  and  Catholics  still 
went  on  below  the  surface.  There  cannot  be  the 
least  doubt  that  Thagaste  took  its  share  in  these 
quarrels.  To  those  who  urged  him  to  be  baptized, 
the  father  of  Augustin  might  well  answer  with 
ironic  politeness  :  ''I  am  only  waiting  till  you 
agree  among  yourselves,  to  see  where  the  truth  lies." 
In  his  heart  this  rather  lukewarm  pagan  had  no 
inveterate  dislike  to  Christianity. 

What  proves  it  at  once  is  that  he  married  a 
Christian. 

How  did  Monnica  become  the  wife  of  Patricius  ? 
How  did  these  two  beings,  so  little  alike,  between 
whom  there  was  such  a  great  difference  of  age,  not 
to  mention  all  the  rest,  come  to  join  their  fate  ? 
Those  are  questions  which  it  would  never  have 
occurred  to  the  people  of  Thagaste  to  ask.  Patricius 
married  to  be  like  everybody  else — and  also  because 
he  was  well  over  forty,  and  his  mother  an  old  woman 
who  would  soon  be  no  longer  able  to  run  his  house. 

Monnica  also  had  her  mother.  The  two  old 
women  had  a  meeting,  with  many  politenesses  and 
ceremonious  bowings,  and  because  the  thing  ap- 
peared to  them  reasonable  and  most  suitable,  they 
settled  the  marriage.  Had  Patricius  ever  seen 
the  girl  that  he  was  going  to  take,  according  to 
custom,  so  as  to  have  a  child-bearer  and  housewife  ? 
It  is  quite  likely  he  had  not.  Was  she  pretty,  rich, 
or  poor  ?    He  considered  such  matters  as  secondary, 


THE   FAMILY   OF  A   SAINT  23 

since  the  marriage  was  not  a  love-match  but  a 
traditional  duty  to  fulfil.  If  the  union  was  respect- 
able, that  was  quite  enough.  But  however  the 
matter  fell  out,  what  is  certain  is  that  Monnica  was 
very  young.  She  was  twenty-two  when  Augustin 
was  born,  and  he  was  probably  not  her  first  child. 
We  know  that  she  was  hardly  marriageable  when  she 
was  handed  over,  as  Arab  parents  do  to-day  with 
their  adolescent  or  little  girls,  to  the  man  who  was 
going  to  marry  her.  Now  in  Africa  girls  become  mar- 
riageable at  a  very  early  age.  They  are  married  at 
fourteen,  sometimes  even  at  twelve.  Perhaps  she 
was  seventeen  or  eighteen  at  most  when  she  married 
Patricius.  She  must  have  had  first  a  son,  Navigius,  f 
whom  we  shall  meet  later  on  at  Milan,  and  also  a' 
daughter,  of  whom  we  do  not  even  know  the  name, 
but  who  became  a  nun,  and  superior  of  a  convent  \ 
in  the  diocese  of  Hippo.  For  us  the  features  of  these 
two  other  children  of  Monnica  and  Patricius  are 
obliterated.  They  are  concealed  by  the  radiance  of 
their  illustrious  great  brother. 

Monnica  was  fond  of  telling  stories  of  her  girl- 
hood to  her  son.  He  has  handed  down  some  of 
them  to  us. 

She  was  brought  up  strictly,  according  to  the 
system  of  that  time.  Both  her  parents  came  of 
families  which  had  been  Christian,  and  Catholic- 
Christian,  for  many  generations.  They  had  never 
been  carried  away  by  the  Donatist  schism  ;  they 
were  people  very  obstinate  in  their  convictions — a 
character  quite  as  frequent  in  Africa  as  its  opposite, 
the  kind  of  Numidian  or  Moor,  who  is  versatile  and 
flighty.  It  is  not  unimportant  that  Augustin  came 
from  this  hard-headed  race,  for  this  it  was,  with  the 


24  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

aid  of  God's  grace,  that  saved  him — the  energetic 
temper  of  his  will. 

Still,  if  the  faith  of  the  young  Monnica  was  con- 
firmed from  her  earliest  years,  it  is  not  so  much  to 
the  lessons  of  her  mother  that  she  owed  it,  as  to  the 
!  training  of  an  old  woman-servant  of  whom  she 
'  always  spoke  with  gratitude.  In  the  family  of  her 
master,  this  old  woman  had  a  place  like  the  one  which 
to-day  in  a  Turkish  family  is  held  by  the  nurse,  the 
dada,  who  is  respected  by  all  the  harem  and  all  the 
household.  Doubtless  she  herself  was  born  in  the 
house  and  had  seen  all  the  children  born.  She 
had  carried  Monnica's  father  on  her  back  when  he  was 
little,  just  as  the  Kabylian  women  or  the  Bedouin 
nomads  carry  their  babies  still.  She  was  a  devoted 
slave,  just  a  bit  unreasonable — a  veritable  house- 
dog who  in  the  zeal  of  guardianship  barks  more 
than  is  necessary  at  the  stranger  who  passes.  She 
was  like  the  negress  in  the  Arab  houses  to-day,  who 
is  often  a  better  Muslem,  more  hostile  to  the  Christian, 
than  her  employers.  The  old  woman  in  Monnica's 
family  had  witnessed  the  last  persecutions  ;  she 
had  perhaps  visited  the  confessors  in  prison  ; 
perhaps  she  had  seen  flow  the  blood  of  the  martyrs. 
These  exciting  and  terrible  scenes  would  have  been 
graven  on  her  memory.  What  inflamed  stories  the 
old  servant  must  have  told  her  young  mistresses, 
what  vital  lessons  of  constancy  and  heroism  ! 
Monnica  listened  to  them  eagerly. 

Because  of  her  great  faith,  this  simple  slave  was 
revered  as  a  saint  by  her  owners,  who  entrusted  her 
with  the  supervision  of  their  daughters.  She  proved 
a  stern  governess,  who  would  stand  no  trifling  with 
her  rules.     She  prevented  these  girls  from  drinking 


THE   FAMILY   OF  A   SAINT  25 

even  water  except  at  meals.  Cruel  suffering  for 
little  Africans  !  Thagaste  is  not  far  from  the  country 
of  thirst.    But  the  old  woman  said  to  them  : 

"  You  drink  water  now  because  you  can't  get  at 
the  wine.  In  time  to  come,  when  you  are  married 
and  have  bins  and  cellars  of  your  own,  you'll  turn 
up  your  nose  at  water,  and  your  habit  of  drinking 
will  be  too  much  for  you." 

Monnica  came  near  fulfilling  the  prophecy  of  the 
honest  woman.  It  was  before  she  was  married. 
As  she  was  very  well-behaved  and  very  temperate, 
she  used  to  be  sent  to  the  cellar  to  draw  the  wine 
from  the  cask.  Before  pouring  it  into  the  flagon  she 
would  sip  just  a  little.  Being  unaccustomed  to  wine, 
she  was  not  able  to  drink  more  ;  it  was  too  strong 
for  her  gullet.  She  did  this,  not  because  she  liked 
the  wine,  but  from  naughtiness,  to  play  a  trick  on 
her  parents  who  trusted  her,  and  also,  of  course, 
because  it  was  prohibited.  Each  time  she  swallowed 
a  little  more,  and  so  it  went  on  till  she  ended  by 
finding  it  rather  nice,  and  came  to  drinking  greedily 
one  cup  after  another.  One  day  a  slave-girl,  who 
went  with  her  to  the  cellar,  began  to  grumble. 
Monnica  gave  her  a  sharp  answer.  Upon  this  the 
girl  called  Monnica  a  drunkard.  .  .  .  Drunkard  ! 
This  bitter  taunt  so  humiliated  the  self-respect 
of  the  future  saint,  that  she  got  the  better  of  her 
taste  for  drink.  Augustin  does  not  say  it  was 
through  piety  she  did  this,  but  because  she  felt  the 
ugliness  of  such  a  vice. 

There  is  a  certain  roughness  in  this  story  of  child- 
hood, the  roughness  of  ancient  customs,  with  which 
is  always  mingled  some  decency  or  dignity.  Christi- 
anity did  the  work  of  polishing  the  soul  of  Monnica. 


26  SAINT   AUGUSTIN 

At  the  time  we  are  dealing  with,  if  she  was  already 
a  very  devout  young  girl,  she  was  far  as  yet  from 
being  the  grand  Christian  that  she  became  after- 
wards. 

When  she  married  Patricius  she  was  a  girl  very 
reserved  and  cold  to  all  appearances  (in  reality,  she 
was  very  passionate),  precise  in  attending  to  her 
religious  duties,  even  a  little  strict,  with  her  exaggera- 
tion of  the  Christian  austerity  in  her  hate  of  all  the 
brutalities  and  all  the  careless  morals  that  paganism 
condoned.  Nevertheless,  this  rigid  soul  knew  how 
to  bend  when  it  was  necessary.  Monnica  had  tact, 
suppleness,  and,  when  it  was  needed,  a  very  acute 
and  very  reasonable  practical  sense  of  which  she 
gave  many  a  proof  in  the  bringing  up  and  manage- 
ment of  her  son  Augustin.  This  soul,  hard  for 
herself,  veiled  her  uncompromising  religion  under 
an  unchangeable  sweetness  which  was  in  her  rather 
the  work  of  grace  than  a  natural  gift. 

There  can  be  little  doubt  that  her  behaviour  and 
character  greatly  disturbed  Patricius  at  the  begin- 
ning of  their  married  life.  Perhaps  he  regretted 
the  marriage.  What  use  had  he  for  this  nun  along- 
side of  him !  Both  of  them  must  have  suffered 
the  usual  annoyances  which  always  appeared  before 
long  in  unions  of  this  kind  between  pagan  and 
Christian.  True,  it  was  no  longer  the  time  of 
Tertullian,  the  heroic  century  of  persecutions, 
when  the  Christian  women  glided  into  the  prisons 
to  kiss  the  shackles  of  the  martyrs.  (What  a 
revenge  did  woman  take  then  for  her  long 
and  enforced  confinement  to  the  women's  apart- 
ments !  And  how  outrageous  such  conduct  must 
have   seemed    to    a   husband    brought    up   in    the 


THE   FAMILY   OF  A   SAINT  27 

Roman  way  !)  But  the  practices  of  the  Christian 
Ufe  estabUshed  a  kind  of  intermittent  divorce 
between  husbands  and  wives  of  different  rehgion. 
Monnica  often  went  out,  either  alone,  or  accompanied 
by  a  faithful  bondwoman.  She  had  to  attend  the 
services  of  the  Church,  to  go  about  the  town  visiting 
the  poor  and  giving  alms.  And  there  were  the  fast- 
days  which  occurred  two  or  three  times  a  week,  , 
and  especially  the  long  fast  of  Lent — a  grievous  | 
nuisance  when  the  husband  wanted  to  give  a  dinner- 
party just  on  those  particular  days  !  On  the  vigil  of 
festivals,  Monnica  would  spend  a  good  part  of  the 
night  in  the  Basilica.  Regularly,  doubtless  on 
Sunda3^s,  she  betook  herself  to  the  cemetery,  or  to 
some  chapel  raised  to  the  memory  of  a  martyr  who 
was  often  buried  there — in  fact,  they  called  these 
chapels  "  Memorials  "  {memorise). 

There  were  many  of  these  chapels — even  too  many 
in  the  opinion  of  austere  Christians.  Monnica  went 
from  one  to  another  carrying  in  a  large  basket  made 
of  willow  branches  some  pieces  of  minced  meat, 
bread,  and  wine  mixed  with  water.  She  met  her 
friends  in  these  places.  They  would  sit  down  around  ■ 
the  tombs,  of  which  some  were  shaped  like  tables, 
unpack  the  provisions,  and  eat  and  drink  piously 
in  honour  of  the  martyr.  This  was  a  residue  of 
pagan  superstition  among  the  Christians.  These 
pious  agapce,  or  love-feasts,  often  turned  into  dis-  \ 
gusting  orgies.  When  Augustin  became  Bishop  of 
Hippo  he  had  considerable  trouble  to  get  his  people 
out  of  the  habit  of  them.  Notwithstanding  his 
efforts,  the  tradition  still  lasts.  Every  Friday  the 
Muslem  women  keep  up  the  custom  of  visiting  the 
cemeteries  and  the  marabouts.    Just  as  in  the  time  of 


28  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

St.  Monnica,  they  sit  around  the  tombs,  so  cool 
with  their  casing  of  painted  tiles,  in  the  shade  of  the 
cypress  and  eucah^ptus.  They  gobble  sweetmeats, 
the}^  gossip,  they  laugh,  they  enjoy  themselves — 
the  husbands  are  not  there. 

Monnica  made  these  visits  in  a  really  pious  state 
of  mind,  and  was  far  from  trying  to  find  in  them 
opportunities  for  lewdness  or  carouse.  She  was 
content  to  drink  a  little  wine  very  carefully — she 
always  bore  in  mind  her  youthful  sin.  Besides,  this 
wine  weakened  with  water  that  she  brought  from 
the  house,  was  tepid  by  the  time  she  reached  the 
cemetery  ;  it  would  be  a  drink  of  very  moderate 
relish,  little  likely  to  stimulate  the  senses.  She 
distributed  what  was  left  of  it  among  the  needy, 
together  with  the  contents  of  her  basket,  and  came 
back  modestly  to  her  house. 

But  however  staid  and  reserved  she  might  be, 
still  these  outings  gave  rise  to  scandalous  talk. 
They  annoyed  a  suspicious  husband.  All  the 
Africans  are  that.  Marital  jealousy  was  not  invented 
by  Islam.  Moreover,  in  Monnica's  time  men  and 
women  took  part  in  these  funeral  love-feasts  and 
mingled  together  disturbingly.  Patricius  got  cross 
about  it,  and  about  a  good  many  other  things  too. 
His  old  mother  chafed  his  suspicions  by  carrying 
to  him  the  ugly  gossip  and  even  the  lies  of  the  ser- 
vants about  his  wife.  By  dint  of  patience  and 
mildness  and  attentions,  Monnica  ended  by  dis- 
arming her  mother-in-law  and  making  it  clear  that 
her  conduct  was  perfect.  The  old  woman  flew  into 
a  rage  with  the  servants  who  had  lied  to  her,  and 
denounced  them  to  her  son.  Patricius,  like  a  good 
head  of  a  household,  had  them  whipped  to  teach 


THE  FAMILY   OF  A  SAINT  29 

them  not  to  lie  any  more.  Thanks  to  this  exemplary 
punishment,  and  the  good  sense  of  the  young  wife, 
peace  reigned  once  more  in  the  family. 

Women,  friends  of  Monnica,  were  amazed  that 
the  good  understanding  was  not  oftener  upset,  at 
least  in  an  open  manner,  between  husband  and  wife. 
Everybody  in  Thagaste  knew  the  quick-tempered 
and  violent  character  of  Patricius.  And  3'^et  there 
were  no  signs  that  he  beat  his  wife.  Nor  did  any  one 
say  he  did.  Other  women  who  had  less  passionate 
husbands  were  nevertheless  beaten  by  them.  When 
they  came  to  Monnica's  house  they  shewed  her 
the  marks  of  the  whacks  they  had  got,  their  faces 
swollen  from  blows,  and  they  burst  out  in  abuse  of 
men,  clamouring  against  their  lechery,  which,  said 
these  matrons,  was  the  cause  of  the  ill-treatment 
they  had  to  endure. 

"  Blame  your  own  tongue,"  retorted  Monnica. 

According  to  her,  women  should  close  their  eyes 
to  the  infidelities  of  their  husbands  and  avoid 
arguing  with  them  when  they  were  angry.  Silence, 
submissiveness,  were  the  all-powerful  arms.  And 
since,  as  a  young  woman,  she  had  a  certain  natural 
merriment,  she  added,  laughing  : 

"  Remember  what  was  read  to  you  on  your 
wedding-day.  You  were  told  that  you  are  the 
handmaids  of  your  husbands.  Don't  rebel  against 
your  masters  !  .  .  ." 

Possibly  this  was  a  keen  criticism  of  the  pagan 
code,  so  hard  in  its  rules.  Still,  in  this  matter,  the 
Roman  law  was  in  agreement  with  the  Gospel. 
Sincere  Christian  as  she  was,  the  wife  of  Patricius 
never  had  any  quarrel  with  him  on  account  of  his 
infidelities.      So    much    kindness    and    resignation 


30  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

touched  the  dissolute  and  brutal  husband,  who 
besides  was  an  excellent  man  and  warm-hearted. 
The  modesty  of  his  wife,  after  a  while,  m.ade  her 
attractive  in  his  eyes.  He  loved  her,  so  to  speak,  on 
the  strength  of  his  respect  and  admiration  for  her. 
He  would  indeed  have  been  a  churl  to  find  fault 
with  a  wife  who  interfered  with  him  so  little  and 
who  was  a  perfect  housekeeper,  as  we  shall  see 
later  on  when  we  come  to  her  life  at  Cassicium.  In 
one  point,  where  even  she  did  not  intend  it,  she 
forwarded  the  interests  of  her  husband  by  gaining 
him  the  good-will  of  the  Christians  in  Thagaste  ; 
while  he,  on  his  side,  could  say  to  the  pagans  who 
looked  askance  at  his  marriage  :  "  Am  I  not  one  of 
yourselves  ? 

In  spite  of  all  the  differences  between  him  and 
Monnica,  Patricius  was  a  contented  husband. 


Ill 

THE    COMFORT   OF   THE    MILK 

A  UGUSTIN  came  into  this  world  the  thirteenth 
J~\  of  November  of  the  year  of  Christ  354. 

It  was  just  one  httle  child  more  in  this  sensual 
and  pleasure-loving  Africa,  land  of  sin  and  of  carnal 
productiveness,  where  children  are  born  and  die 
like  the  leaves.  But  the  son  of  Monnica  and 
Patricius  was  predestined  :  he  was  not  to  die  in  the 
cradle  like  so  many  other  tiny  Africans. 

Even  if  he  had  not  been  intended  for  great  things, 
if  he  had  been  only  a  head  in  the  crowd,  the  arrival 
of  this  baby  ought,  all  the  same,  to  affect  us,  for 
to  the  Christian,  the  destiny  of  the  obscurest  and 
humblest  of  souls  is  a  matter  of  importance.  Forty 
years  afterwards,  Augustin,  in  his  Confessions, 
pondered  this  slight  ordinary  fact  of  his  birth,  ^ 
which  happened  almost  unnoticed  by  the  inhabi- 
tants of  Thagaste,  and  in  truth  it  seems  to  him 
a  great  event,  not  because  it  concerns  himself, 
bishop  and  Father  of  the  Church,  but  because  it  is 
a  soul  which  at  this  imperceptible  point  of  time 
comes  into  the  world. 

Let  us  clearly  understand  Augustin's  thought. 
Souls  have  been  ransomed  by  a  Victim  of  infinite 
value.  They  have  themselves  an  infinite  value. 
Nothing  which  goes  on  in  them  can  be  ignored. 
Their    most    trifling    sins,    their    feeblest    stirrings 

31 


32  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

towards  virtue,  are  vital  for  the  eternit}-^  of  their  lot. 
All  shall  be  attributed  to  them  by  the  just  Judge. 
The  theft  of  an  apple  will  weigh  perhaps  as  heavily 
in  the  scales  as  the  seizure  of  a  province  or  a  king- 
dom. The  evil  of  sin  is  in  the  evil  intention.  Now 
the  fate  of  a  soul,  created  by  God,  on  Him  depends. 
Hence  everything  in  a  human  life  assumes  an  extreme 
seriousness  and  importance.  In  the  history  of  a 
creature,  all  is  worthy  of  being  examined,  weighed, 
studied,  and  perhaps  also,  for  the  edification  of 
others,  told. 

Here  is  an  altogether  new  way  of  regarding  life, 
and,  proceeding  from  that,  of  understanding  art. 
Even  as  the  slaves,  thanks  to  Christianity,  came 
into  the  spiritual  cit}^,  so  the  most  minute  realities 
by  this  outlook  are  to  be  included  in  literature. 
The  Confessions  will  be  the  first  model  of  the  art  of 
the  new  era.  A  deep  and  magnificent  realism, 
because  it  goes  even  to  the  very  depths  of  the  divine 
— utterly  distinct,  at  any  rate,  from  our  surface 
realism  of  mere  amusement — is  about  to  arise  from 
this  new  conception.  Without  doubt,  in  Augustin's 
eyes,  beauty  dwells  in  all  things,  in  so  far  forth  as 
beauty  is  a  reflection  of  the  order  and  the  thought 
of  the  Word.  But  it  has  also  a  more  essential 
character — it  has  a  moral  signification  and  value. 
Everything,  in  a  word,  can  be  the  instrument  of 
the  loss  or  the  redemption  of  a  soul.  The  most 
insignificant  of  our  actions  reverberates  to  infini- 
tude on  our  fate.  Regarded  from  this  point,  both 
things  and  beings  commence  to  live  a  life  more 
closely  leagued  together  and  at  the  same  time  more 
private;  more  individual  and  more  general.  All  is 
in  the  lump,  and  nevertheless  all  is  separate.     Our 


THE   COMFORT  OF  THE   MILK         33 

salvation  concerns  only  ourselves,  and  yet  through 
charity  it  becomes  involved  with  the  salvation  of 
our  fellows. 

In  this  spirit  let  us  look  at  the  cradle  of  Augustin. 
Let  us  look  at  it  with  the  eyes  of  Augustin  himself, 
and  also,  perchance,  of  Monnica.  Bending  over  the 
frail  body  of  the  little  child  he  once  was,  he  puts  to 
himself  all  the  great  desperate  questions  which  have 
shaken  humanity  for  thousands  of  years.  The 
mystery  of  life  and  death  rises  before  him,  formid- 
able. It  tortures  him  to  the  point  of  anguish,  of 
confusion  :  "  Yet  suffer  me  to  speak  before  Thy 
mercy,  me  who  am  but  dust  and  ashes.  Yea,  suffer 
me  to  speak,  for,  behold,  I  speak  not  to  man  who 
scorns  me,  but  to  Thy  mercy.  Even  Thou  perhaps 
dost  scorn  me,  but  Thou  wilt  turn  and  have  pity. 
For  what  is  it  that  I  would  say,  O  Lord  my  God, 
save  that  I  know  not  whence  I  came  hither  into  this 
dying  life,  shall  I  call  it,  or  living  death  ?  .  .  .  And, 
lo,  my  infancy  has  long  been  dead,  and  I  live.  But 
Thou,  O  Lord,  who  ever  livest  and  in  whom  nothing 
ever  dies — tell  me,  I  beseech  Thee,  O  God,  and  have 
mercy  on  my  misery,  tell  me  whether  another  life 
of  mine  died  before  my  infancy  began." 

One  is  reminded  here  of  Pascal's  famous  proso- 
popoeia :  "I  know  not  who  has  put  me  into  the 
world,  nor  what  the  world  is,  nor  myself.  I  am  in 
a  terrible  ignorance  about  everything.  .  .  .  All  I 
know  is  that  I  must  soon  die,  but  what  I  know  least 
of  all  is  this  very  death  which  I  cannot  escape." 

The  phrases  of  the  Pensees  are  only  the  echo  of  the 
phrases  of  the  Confessions.  But  how  different  is 
the  tone  !  Pascal's  charge  against  human  ignorance 
is  merciless.   The  God  of  Port-Royal  has  the  hard  and 


34  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

motionless  face  of  the  ancient  Destiny  :  He  with- 
draws into  the  clouds,  and  only  shews  Himself  at  the 
end  to  raise  up  His  poor  creature.  In  Augustin  the 
accent  is  tender,  trusting,  really  like  a  son,  and 
though  he  be  harassed,  one  can  discern  the  thrill 
of  an  unconquerable  hope.  Instead  of  crushing  man 
under  the  iron  hand  of  the  Justice-dealer,  he  makes 
him  feel  the  kindness  of  the  Father  who  has  got  all 
ready,  long  before  its  birth,  for  the  feeble  little  child  : 
"  The  comforts  of  Thy  pity  received  me,  as  I  have 
heard  from  the  father  and  mother  of  my  flesh.  .  .  . 
And  so  the  comfort  of  woman's  milk  was  ready  for  me. 
For  my  mother  and  my  nurses  did  not  fill  their 
own  bosoms,  but  Thou,  O  Lord,  by  their  means 
gavest  me  the  food  of  infancy,  according  to  Thy 
ordinance.  ..." 

And  see  !  his  heart  overflows  at  this  remembrance 
of  his  mother's  milk.  The  great  doctor  humbles  his 
style,  makes  it  simple  and  familiar,  to  tell  us  of  his 
first  mewlings,  and  of  his  baby  angers  and  joys.  He 
too  was  a  father  ;  he  knew  what  is  a  new-born  child, 
and  a  young  mother  who  gives  it  suck,  because  he 
had  seen  that  with  his  own  eyes  close  beside  him. 
All  the  small  bothers  which  mingle  with  the  pleasures 
of  fatherhood  he  had  experienced  himself.  In  his 
own  son  he  studied  himself. 

This  child,  born  of  a  Christian  mother,  and  who 
was  to  become  the  great  defender  of  the  faith,  was 
not  christened  at  his  birth.  In  the  early  Church, 
and  especially  in  the  African  Church,  it  was  not 
usual  to  do  so.  The  baptismal  day  was  put  as  far 
off  as  possible,  from  the  conviction  that  the  sins 
committed  after  the  sacrament   were  much  more 


THE   COMFORT   OF   THE   MILK  35 

serious  than  those  which  went  before.  The  Africans, 
very  practical  folk,  clearly  foresaw  that  they  would 
sin  again  even  after  baptism,  but  they  wanted  to 
sin  at  a  better  rate,  and  lessen  the  inflictions  of 
penance.  This  penance  in  Augustin's  time  was  far 
from  being  as  hard  as  in  the  century  before.  Never- 
theless, the  remembrance  of  the  old  severity  always 
remained,  and  the  habit  was  taken  to  put  off  baptism 
so  as  not  to  discourage  sinners  overmuch. 

Monnica,  always  sedulous  to  conform  with  the 
customs  of  her  country  and  the  traditions  of  her 
Church,  fell  in  with  this  practice.  Perhaps  she  may 
have  had  also  the  opposition  of  her  husband  to  face, 
for  he  being  a  pagan  would  not  have  cared  to  give 
too  many  pledges  to  the  Christians,  nor  to  com- 
promise himself  in  the  eyes  of  his  fellow-pagans  by 
shewing  that  he  was  so  far  under  the  control  of 
Christian  zealots  as  to  have  his  child  baptized  out 
of  the  ordinary  way.  There  was  a  middle  course, 
and  this  was  to  inscribe  the  child  among  the  catechu- 
mens. According  to  the  rite  of  the  first  admission 
to  the  lowest  order  of  catechumens,  the  sign  of  the 
cross  was  made  on  Augustin's  forehead,  and  the 
symbolic  salt  placed  between  his  lips.  And  so  they 
did  not  baptize  him.  Possibly  this  affected  his 
whole  life.  He  lacked  the  baptismal  modesty. 
Even  when  he  was  become  a  bishop,  he  never  quite 
cast  off  the  old  man  that  had  splashed  through  all 
the  pagan  uncleannesses.  Some  of  his  words  are 
painfully  broad  for  chaste  ears.  The  influence  of 
African  conditions  does  not  altogether  account  for 
this.  It  is  only  too  plain  that  the  son  of  Patricius 
had  never  known  entire  virginity  of  soul. 

They    named    him    Aurelius    Augustinus.      Was 


36  SAINT   AUGUSTIN 

Aurelius  his  family  name  ?  We  cannot  tell.  The 
Africans  always  applied  very  fantastically  the  rules 
of  Roman  nomenclature.  Anyhow,  this  name  was 
common  enough  in  Africa.  The  Bishop  of  Carthage, 
primate  of  the  province  and  a  friend  of  Augustin, 
was  also  called  Aurelius.  Pious  commentators  have 
sought  to  find  in  this  name  an  omen  of  Augustin's 
future  renown  as  an  orator.  They  have  remarked 
that  the  word  aumm,  gold,  is  contained  in  Aurelius 
— a  prophetic  indication  of  the  golden  mouth  of 
the  great  preacher  of  Hippo. 

Meanwhile,  he  was  a  baby  like  any  other  baby, 
who  only  knew,  as  he  tells  us,  how  to  take  his  mother's 
breast.  However,  he  speaks  of  nurses  who  suckled 
him  ;  no  doubt  these  were  servants  or  slaves  of  the 
household.  They  gave  him  their  milk,  like  those 
Algerian  women  who,  to-day,  if  their  neighbour  is 
called  away,  take  her  child  and  feed  it.  Besides, 
with  them  children  are  weaned  much  later  than  with 
us.  You  can  see  mothers  sitting  at  their  doors  put 
down  their  work  and  call  to  a  child  of  two  or  three 
plajdng  in  the  street  for  him  to  come  and  take  the 
breast.  Did  Augustin  remember  these  things  ?  At 
least  he  recalled  his  nurses'  games,  and  the  efforts 
they  made  to  appease  him,  and  the  childish  words 
they  taught  him  to  stammer.  The  first  Latin  words 
he  repeated,  he  picked  up  from  his  mother  and  the 
servants,  who  must  also  have  spoken  Punic,  the 
ordinary  tongue  of  the  populace  and  small  trader 
class.  He  learned  Punic  without  thinking  about  it, 
in  playing  with  other  children  of  Thagaste,  just  as 
the  sons  of  our  colonists  learn  Arab  in  playing  with 
little  boys  who  wear  chechias  on  their  heads. 

He  is  a  Christian,  a  bishop,  already  a  venerated 


THE  COMFORT  OF  THE   MH^K  37 

Father,  consulted  by  the  whole  Catholic  world,  and 
he  tells  us  all  that.  He  tells  it  in  a  serious  and 
contrite  way,  with  a  manifest  anxiety  to  attribute 
to  God,  as  the  sole  cause,  all  the  benefits  which 
embellished  his  childhood,  as  well  as  to  deplore  his 
faults  and  wretchedness,  fatal  consequence  of  the 
original  Fall.  And  still,  we  can  make  out  clearly 
that  these  suave  and  far-off  memories  have  a 
charm  for  him  which  he  cannot  quite  guard  himself 
against.  The  attitude  of  the  author  of  the  Con- 
fessions is  ambiguous  and  a  little  constrained.  The 
father  who  has  loved  his  child,  who  has  joined  in 
his  games,  struggles  in  him  against  the  theologian 
who  later  on  was  to  uphold  the  doctrine  of  Grace 
against  the  heretics.  He  feels  that  he  must  shew, 
not  only  that  Grace  is  necessary  for  salvation  and 
that  little  children  ought  to  be  baptized,  but  that 
they  are  capable  of  sinning.  Yes,  the  children  sin 
even  at  nurse.  And  Augustin  relates  this  story  of 
a  baby  that  he  had  seen  :  "I  know,  because  I  have 
seen,  jealousy  in  a  babe.  It  could  not  speak,  yet  it 
eyed  its  foster-brother  with  pale  cheeks  and  looks  of 
hate."  Children  are  already  men.  The  egoism  and 
greediness  of  the  grown  man  may  be  already 
descried  in  the  newly  born. 

However,  the  theologian  of  Grace  was  not  able  to 
drive  from  his  mind  this  verse  of  the  Gospel  :  Sinite 
ad  me  parvulos  venire — "  Suffer  little  children  to 
come  unto  Me."  But  he  interprets  this  in  a  very 
narrow  sense,  luring  it  into  an  argument  which 
furthers  his  case.  For  him,  the  small  height  of 
children  is  a  symbol  of  the  humility  without  which 
no  one  can  enter  God's  kingdom.  The  Master, 
according  to  him,  never  intended  us  to  take  children 


/3  '^J'C  /^ ' 


"♦■  it~ 


38  SAINT   AUGUSTIN 

as  an  example.  They  are  but  flesh  of  sin.  He  only 
drew  from  their  littleness  one  of  those  similitudes 
which  He,  with  His  fondness  for  symbols,  favoured. 
Well,  let  us  dare  to  say  it  :  Augustin  goes  wrong 
here.  Such  is  the  penalty  of  human  thought,  which 
in  its  justest  statements  always  wounds  some  truth 
less  clear  or  mutilates  some  tender  sentiment. 
Radically,  Augustin  is  right.  The  child  is  wicked 
as  man  is.  We  know  it.  But  against  the  relentless- 
ness  of  the  theologian  we  place  the  divine  gentleness 
of  Christ  :  *'  Suffer  little  children  to  come  unto  Me, 
for  of  such  is  the  Kingdom  of  God." 


IV 

THE    FIRST   GAMES 

"  T  LOVED  to  play,"  Augustin  says,  in  telling  us 

X    of  those  far-off  years. 

Is  it  surprising  if  this  quick  and  supple  intelligence, 
who  mastered  without  effort,  and  as  if  by  instinct, 
the  encyclopaedic  knowledge  of  his  age,  who  found 
himself  at  his  ease  amidst  the  deepest  abstractions, 
did,  at  the  beginning,  take  life  as  a  game  ? 

The  amusements  of  the  little  Africans  of  to-day  are 
not  very  many,  nor  very  various  either.  They  have 
no  inventive  imagination.  In  this  matter  their 
French  playfellows  have  taught  them  a  good  deal. 
If  they  play  marbles,  or  hopscotch,  or  rounders, 
it  is  in  imitation  of  the  Roumis.  And  yet  they  are 
great  little  players.  Games  of  chance  attract  them 
above  all.  At  these  they  spend  hour  after  hour, 
stretched  out  flat  on  their  stomachs  in  some  shady 
corner,  and  they  play  with  an  astonishing  intensity 
of  passion.  All  their  attention  is  absorbed  in  what 
they  are  about  ;  they  employ  on  the  game  all  the 
cunning  of  their  wits,  precociously  developed,  and  so 
soon  stuck  fast  in  material  things. 

When  Augustin  recalls  the  games  of  his  childhood, 
he  only  mentions  "nuts,"  handball,  and  birds.  To 
capture  a  bird,  that  winged,  light,  and  brilliant  thing, 
is  what  all  children  long  to  do  in  every  country  on 
earth.    But  in  Africa,  where  there  are  plenty  of  birds, 

39 


40  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

big  people  as  well  as  little  love  them.  In  the  Moorish 
cafes,  in  the  wretchedest  gourhis,  cages  made  of  reeds 
are  hung  on  the  walls,  all  rustling  with  trills  and 
fluttering  of  wings.  Quail,  thrushes,  nightingales  are 
imprisoned  in  them.  The  nightingale,  the  singing- 
bird  beyond  all  others,  so  difficult  to  tame,  is  the 
honoured  guest,  the  privileged  dweller  in  these 
rustic  cages.  With  the  rose,  he  is  an  essential  part 
of  Arab  poetry.  The  woods  round  about  Thagaste 
were  full  of  nightingales.  Not  the  least  doubt  that 
the  child  Augustin  had  felt  the  little  musical  throats 
of  these  singing-birds  throb  between  his  hands. 
His  sermons,  his  heaviest  treatises,  have  a  recollec- 
tion of  them.  He  draws  from  them  an  evidence  in 
favour  of  the  creating  Word  who  has  put  beauty 
and  harmony  everywhere.  In  the  song  of  the 
nightingale  he  finds,  as  it  were,  an  echo  of  the  music 
of  the  spheres. 

If  he  loved  birds,  as  a  poet  who  knows  not  that 
he  is  a  poet,  did  he  love  as  well  to  play  at  "  nuts  "  ? 
"  Nuts,"  or  thimble-rigging,  is  only  a  graceful  and 
crafty  game,  too  crafty  for  a  dreaming  and  careless 
little  boy.  It  calls  for  watchfulness  and  presence  of 
mind.  Grown  men  play  at  it  as  well  as  children. 
A  step  of  a  staircase  is  used  as  a  table  by  the  players, 
or  the  pavement  of  a  courtyard.  Three  shells  are 
laid  on  the  stone  and  a  dried  pea.  Then,  with  rapid 
baffling  movements,  hands  brown  and  alert  fly 
from  one  shell  to  another,  shuffle  them,  mix  them 
up,  juggle  the  dried  pea  sometimes  under  this  shell, 
sometimes  under  that, — and  the  point  is  to  guess 
which  shell  the  pea  has  got  under.  By  means  of 
certain  astute  methods,  an  artful  player  can  make 
the  pea  stick  to  his  fingers,  or  to  the  inside  of  the 


THE  FIRST   GAMES  41 

shell,  and  the  opponent  loses  every  time.  They  cheat 
with  a  calm  shamelessness.  Augustin  cheated  too — 
which  did  not  prevent  him  from  bitterly  denouncing 
the  cheating  of  his  fellow-players. 

The  truth  is,  that  he  would  not  have  quite  belonged 
to  his  country  if  he  had  not  lied  and  stolen  now  and 
then.  He  lied  to  his  tutor  and  to  his  schoolmasters. 
He  stole  at  his  parents'  table,  in  the  kitchen,  and 
in  the  cellar.  But  he  stole  like  a  man  of  quality, 
to  make  presents  and  to  win  over  his  playfellows  : 
he  ruled  the  other  boys  by  his  presents — a  note- 
worthy characteristic  in  this  future  ruler  of  souls. 
Morals  like  these,  a  little  rough,  shape  free  and  bold 
natures.  Those  African  children  were  much  less 
coddled,  much  less  scolded,  than  to-day.  Monnica 
had  something  else  to  do  than  to  look  after  the 
boys.  So  for  them  it  was  a  continual  life  in  the 
open  air,  which  makes  the  body  strong  and  hard. 
Augustin  and  his  companions  should  be  pictured 
as  young  wild-cats. 

This  roughness  came  out  strong  at  games  of  ball, 
and  generally  at  all  the  games  in  which  there  are 
two  sides,  conquerors  and  prisoners,  or  fights  with 
sticks  and  stones.  Stone-throwing  is  an  incurable 
habit  among  the  little  Africans.  Even  now  in  the 
towns  our  police  are  obliged  to  take  measures  against 
these  ferocious  children.  In  Augustin's  time,  at 
Cherchell,  which  is  the  ancient  Ccesarea  MauretanicB, 
the  childish  population  was  split  into  two  hostile 
camps  which  stoned  each  other.  On  certain  holidays 
the  fathers  and  big  brothers  joined  the  children  ; 
blood  flowed,  and  there  were  deaths. 

The  bishop  Augustin  recalls  with  severity  the 
"  superb  victories  "  he  won  in  jousts  of  this  kind. 


42  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

But  I  find  it  hard  to  believe  that  such  a  dehcate  child 
(he  was  sickly  almost  all  his  life)  could  have  got 
much  pleasure  out  of  these  brutal  sports.  If  he 
was  drawn  into  them  by  the  example  of  others,  it 
must  have  been  through  the  imagination  they 
appealed  to  him.  In  these  battles,  wherein  sides 
took  the  field  as  Romans  against  Carthaginians, 
Greeks  against  Trojans,  he  believed  himself  Scipio 
or  Hannibal,  Achilles  or  Hector.  He  experienced 
beforehand,  as  a  rhetorician,  the  intoxication  of  a 
triumph  which  playfellows  who  were  stronger  and 
better  provided  with  muscles  gave  him  a  hard  fight 
for.  He  did  not  always  get  the  upper  hand,  except 
perhaps  when  he  bribed  the  enemy.  But  an  eager 
young  soul,  such  as  he  was,  can  hardly  be  content 
with  half- victories ;  he  wants  to  excel.  Accordingly, 
he  sought  his  revenge  in  those  games  wherein  the 
mind  has  the  chief  part.  He  listened  to  stories 
with  delight,  and  in  his  turn  repeated  them  to  his 
little  friends,  thus  trying  upon  an  audience  of  boys 
that  charm  of  speech  by  which  later  he  was 
to  subdue  crowds.  They  also  played  at  acting,  at 
gladiators,  at  drivers  and  horses.  Some  of  Augustin's 
companions  were  sons  of  wealthy  citizens  who  gave 
splendid  entertainments  to  their  fellow-countrymen. 
As  these  dramatic  representations,  or  games  of  the 
arena  or  circus,  drew  near,  the  little  child-world  was 
overcome  by  a  fever  of  imitation.  All  the  children 
of  Thagaste  imitated  the  actors,  the  mirmillones, 
or  the  horsemen  in  the  amphitheatre,  just  as  the 
young  Spaniards  of  to-day  imitate  the  toreros. 

In  the  midst  of  these  amusements  Augustin  fell  ill ; 
he  had  lever  and  violent  pains  in  the  stomach. 
They  thought  he  was  going  to  die.     It  appears  that 


THE   FIRST  GAMES  43 

it  was  himself  who  in  this  extreme  situation  asked 
for  baptism.  Monnica  was  making  all  haste  to  have 
the  sacrament  administered,  when  suddenly,  against 
all  expectation,  the  child  recovered.  Again  was 
baptism  postponed,  and  from  the  same  reason  :  to 
lessen  the  gravity  of  the  sins  which  young  Augustin 
was  bound  to  commit.  His  mother,  who  no  doubt 
foresaw  some  of  them,  again  fell  in  with  the  custom. 

It  is  possible  that  Patricius  interfered  this  time  in 
a  more  decided  way.  Just  at  this  period  Catholicism 
was  in  an  unfavourable  situation.  The  short 
reign  of  Julian  had  started  a  violent  pagan  reaction. 
Everywhere  the  temples  were  reopening,  the  sacri- 
fices beginning  again.  Moreover,  the  Donatists 
secretly  aided  the  pagans.  Their  Seids,  more  or  less 
acknowledged,  the  Circoncelliones,  bands  of  fanatical 
peasants,  scoured  through  the  Numidian  country, 
attacking  the  Catholics,  ravaging  and  pillaging, 
and  burning  their  farms  and  villas.  Was  this  a  good 
time  to  make  a  noisy  profession  of  faith,  to  be  en- 
rolled among  the  ranks  of  the  conquered  party  ? 

Little  Augustin  knew  nothing  of  all  these 
calculations  of  motherly  prudence  and  fatherly 
diplomacy  :  he  begged  for  baptism,  so  he  tells 
us.  This  seems  very  remarkable  in  so  young  a 
child.  But  he  lived  in  a  house  where  all  the  service 
was  done  by  Christians.  He  heard  the  talk  of 
Monnica's  friends  ;  perhaps,  too,  of  his  grandparents, 
who  were  Catholics  faithful  and  austere.  And  then, 
his  soul  was  naturally  reHgious.  That  explains 
everything  :  he  asked  for  baptism  to  be  like  grown- 
up people,  and  because  he  was  predestined.  Among 
children,  the  chosen  have  these  sudden  flashes  of 
Hght.     At  certain  moments  they  feel  what  one  day 


44  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

they  shall  be.  Anj^how,  Monnica  must  have  seen 
this  sign  with  joy. 

He  got  well,  and  took  up  again  his  little  boy's 
life,  divided  between  play,  and  dawdling,  and  school. 

School  !  painful  memory  for  Augustin  !  They 
sent  him  to  the  primus  magister,  the  elementary 
teacher,  a  real  terror,  armed  with  a  long  switch 
which  came  down  without  pity  on  idle  boys.  Seated 
on  benches  around  him,  or  crouched  on  mats,  the 
boys  sang  out  all  together  :  "  One  and  one  are  two, 
two  and  two  are  four " — horrible  refrain  which 
deafened  the  whole  neighbourhood.  The  school 
was  often  a  mere  shed,  or  a  pergola  in  the  fields  which 
was  protected  fairly  well  from  sun  and  rain  by 
cloths  stretched  overhead — a  hut  rented  for  a 
trifle,  wide  open  to  the  winds,  with  a  mosquito-net 
stretched  out  before  the  entrance.  All  who  were 
there  must  have  frozen  in  winter  and  broiled  in 
summer.  Augustin  remembered  it  as  a  slaves' 
chain-prison  (ergastulum)  of  bo3^hood. 

He  hated  school  and  what  they  taught  there — the 
alphabet,  counting,  and  the  rudiments  of  Latin  and 
Greek  grammar.  He  had  a  perfect  horror  of  lessons 
— of  Greek  above  all.  This  schoolboy,  who  became, 
when  his  turn  came,  a  master,  objected  to  the 
methods  of  school.  His  mind,  which  grasped  things 
instinctively  at  a  single  bound,  could  not  stand  the 
gradual  procedure  of  the  teaching  faculty.  He 
either  mastered  difficulties  at  once,  or  gave  them  up. 
Augustin  was  one  of  the  numerous  victims  of  the 
everlasting  mistake  of  schoolmasters,  who  do  not 
know  how  to  arrange  their  lessons  to  accord  with 
various  kinds  of  mind.  Like  most  of  those  who 
eventually  become  great  men,  he  was  no  good  as  a 


THE   FIRST   GAMES  45 

pupil.  He  was  often  punished,  thrashed — and 
cruelly  thrashed.  The  master's  scourge  filled  him  with 
an  unspeakable  terror.  When  he  was  smarting  all 
over  from  cuts  and  came  to  complain  to  his  parents, 
they  laughed  at  him  or  made  fun  of  him — yes,  even 
the  pious  Monnica.  Then  the  poor  lad,  not  knowing 
whom  to  turn  to,  remembered  hearing  his  mother 
and  the  servants  talk  of  a  Being,  very  powerful 
and  very  good,  who  defends  the  orphan  and  the 
oppressed.  And  he  said  from  the  depths  of  his 
heart : 

"  O  my  God,  please  grant  that  I  am  not  whipped 
at  school." 

But  God  did  not  hear  his  prayer  because  he  was 
not  a  good  boy.    Augustin  was  in  despair. 

It  is  evident  that  these  punishments  were  cruel, 
because  forty  years  afterwards  he  denounces  them 
with  horror.  In  his  mind,  they  are  tortures  com- 
parable to  the  wooden  horse  or  the  iron  pincers. 
Nothing  is  small  for  children,  especially  for  a 
sensitive  child  like  Augustin.  Their  sensitiveness 
and  their  imagination  exaggerate  all  things  out  of 
due  measure.  In  this  matter,  also,  schoolmasters 
often  go  wrong.  They  do  not  know  how  to  handle 
delicate  organizations.  They  strike  fiercely,  when 
a  few  words  said  at  the  right  moment  would  have 
much  more  effect  on  the  culprit.  .  .  .  Monnica's 
son  suffered  as  much  from  the  rod  as  he  took  pride 
in  his  successes  at  games.  If,  as  Scipio,  he  was  filled 
with  a  sensation  of  glory  in  his  battles  against  other 
boys,  no  doubt  he  pictured  himself  a  martyr,  a 
St.  Laurence  or  St.  Sebastian,  when  he  was  swished. 
He  never  pardoned — save  as  a  Christian — ^his  school- 
masters for  having  brutalized  him. 


46  SAINT   AUGUSTIN 

Nevertheless,  despite  his  hatred  for  ill-ordered 
lessons,  his  precocious  intelligence  was  remarked 
by  everybody.  It  was  clear  that  such  lucky  gifts 
should  not  be  neglected.  Monnica,  no  doubt,  was  the 
first  to  get  this  into  her  head,  and  she  advised  Patri- 
cius  to  make  Augustin  read  for  a  learned  profession. 

The  business  of  the  curia  was  not  exactly  brilliant, 
and  so  he  may  have  perceived  that  his  son  might 
raise  their  fortunes  if  he  had  definite  employment. 
Augustin,  a  professor  of  eloquence  or  a  celebrated 
pleader,  might  be  the  saviour  and  the  benefactor 
of  his  family.  The  town  councils,  and  even  the 
Imperial  treasury,  paid  large  salaries  to  rhetoricians. 
In  those  days,  rhetoric  led  to  everything.  Some 
of  the  professors  who  went  from  town  to  town  giving 
lectures  made  considerable  fortunes.  At  Thagaste 
they  pointed  with  admiration  to  the  example  of  the 
rhetorician  Victorinus,  an  African,  a  fellow-country- 
man, who  had  made  a  big  reputation  over-seas, 
and  had  his  statue  in  the  Roman  Forum.  And 
many  years  before,  had  not  M.  Cornelius  Fronto,  of 
Cirta,  another  African,  become  the  tutor  of  Marcus 
Aurelius,  who  covered  him  with  honours  and  wealth 
and  finally  raised  him  to  the  Consulship  ?  Pertinax 
himself,  did  he  not  begin  as  a  simple  teacher  of 
grammar,  and  become  Proconsul  of  Africa  and  then 
Emperor  of  Rome  ?  How  many  stimulants  for  pro- 
vincial ambition  !  .  .  . 

Augustin's  parents  reasoned  as  the  middle-class 
parents  of  to-day.  The}^  discounted  the  future, 
and  however  hard  up  they  were,  they  resolved  to 
make  sacrifices  for  his  education.  And  as  the 
schools  of  Thagaste  were  inadequate,  it  was  decided 
to  send  this  very  promising  boy  to  Madaura. 


V 

THE   SCHOOLBOY   OF   MADAURA 

ANEW  world  opened  before  Augustin.  It  was 
perhaps  the  first  time  he  had  ever  gone  away 
from  Thagaste. 

Of  course,  Madaura  is  not  very  far  off ;  there 
are  about  thirty  miles  at  most  between  the  two 
towns.  But  there  are  no  short  journe3^s  for  chil- 
dren. This  one  lay  along  the  military  road  which 
ran  from  Hippo  to  Theveste — a  great  Roman 
causeway  paved  with  large  flags  on  the  outskirts 
of  towns,  and  carefully  pebbled  over  all  the  rest 
of  the  distance.  Erect  upon  the  high  saddle  of  his 
horse,  Augustin,  who  was  to  become  a  tireless 
traveller  and  move  about  ceaselessly  over  African 
roads  during  all  his  episcopal  life — Augustin  got  his 
first  glimpse  of  the  poetry  of  the  open  road,  a 
poetry  which  we  have  lost  for  ever.  -^ 

How  amusing  they  were,  the  African  roads  of 
those  days,  how  full  of  sights  !  Pauses  were  made 
at  inns  with  walls  thick  as  the  ramparts  of  citadels, 
their  interiors  bordered  by  stables  built  in  arcades, 
heaped  up  with  travellers'  packs  and  harness.  In 
the  centre  were  the  trough  and  cistern  ;  and  to  the 
little  rooms  opening  in  a  circle  on  to  the  balcony, 
drifted  up  a  smell  of  oil  and  fodder,  and  the  noise 
of  men  and  of  beasts  of  burthen,  and  of  the  camels 
as   they   entered   majestically,   curving   their   long 

47 


48  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

necks  under  the  lintel  of  the  door.  Then  there  was 
talk  with  the  merchants,  just  arrived  from  the  south, 
who  brought  news  of  the  nomad  countries  and  had 
stories  to  tell.  And  then,  without  hurrying,  a  start 
was  made  again  for  the  next  stage.  Long  files  of 
chariots  were  encountered  carrying  provisions  to 
soldiers  garrisoned  on  the  frontier,  or  the  State- 
distributed  corn  of  the  Roman  people  to  the  sea- 
ports ;  or  again,  from  time  to  time,  the  lectica, 
brought  along  by  slaves  or  mules,  of  a  bishop  on  a 
visitation  ;  and  then  the  litter,  with  close-drawn 
curtains,  of  a  matron  or  some  great  personage.  Of 
a  sudden  all  pulled  sharp  to  one  side  ;  the  vehicles 
lined  up  on  the  edge  of  the  road  ;  and  there  passed 
at  full  speed,  in  a  cloud  of  dust,  a  messenger  of  the 
Imperial  Post.  .  .  . 

Certainly  this  road  from  Hippo  to  Theveste  was 
one  of  the  busiest  and  most  picturesque  in  the 
j^  province  :   it  was  one  of  its  main  arteries. 

At  first  the  look  of  the  country  is  rather  like  the 
neighbourhood  of  Thagaste.  The  wooded  and 
mountainous  landscape  still  spreads  out  its  little 
breast-shaped  hills  and  its  sheets  of  verdure.  Here 
and  there  the  road  skirts  the  deeply-ravined  valley 
of  the  Medjerda.  At  the  foot  of  the  precipitous 
slopes,  the  river  can  be  heard  brawling  in  a  torrent 
over  its  stony  bed,  and  there  are  sharp  descents 
among  thickets  of  juniper  and  the  fringed  roots  of 
the  dwarf-pines.  Then,  as  the  descent  continues, 
the  land  becomes  thinner  and  spaces  bare  of  vegeta- 
tion appear  oftener.  At  last,  upon  a  piece  of  table- 
land, Madaura  comes  into  view,  all  white  in  the 
midst  of  the  vast  tawny  plain,  where  to-day  nothing 
is  to  be  seen  but  a  mausoleum  in  ruins,  the  remains 


THE  SCHOOLBOY   OF  MADAURA       49 

of  a  Byzantine  fortress,  and  vague  traces  vanishing 
away. 

This  is  the  first  rise  of  the  great  plain  which 
decUnes  towards  Theveste  and  the  group  of  the 
Aures  Mountains.  Coming  from  the  woodland 
country  of  Thagaste,  the  nakedness  of  it  is  startling. 
Here  and  there,  thin  cows  crop  starveling  shrubs 
which  have  grown  on  the  bank  of  some  oued  run 
dry.  Little  asses,  turned  loose,  save  themselves  at 
a  gallop  towards  the  tents  of  the  nomads,  spread 
out,  black  and  hair}^  like  immense  bats  on  the 
whiteness  of  the  land.  Nearer,  a  woman's  red 
haick  interposes,  the  single  stain  of  bright  colour 
breaking  the  indefinite  brown  and  grey  of  the 
plain.  Here  is  felt  the  harshness  of  Numidia  ;  it  is 
almost  the  stark  spaces  of  the  desert  world.  But 
on  the  side  towards  the  east,  the  architecture  of 
mountains,  wildly  sculptured,  stands  against  the 
level  reaches  of  the  horizon.  Upon  the  clear  back- 
ground of  the  sky,  shew,  distinctly,  lateral  spurs 
and  a  cone  like  to  the  mystic  representation  of  Tanit. 
Towards  the  south,  crumbling  isolated  crags  appear, 
scattered  about  like  gigantic  pedestals  uncrowned 
of  their  statues,  or  like  the  pipes  of  an  organ  raised 
there  to  capture  and  attune  the  cry  of  the  great 
winds  of  the  steppe. 

This  country  is  characterized  by  a  different  kind 
of  energy  from  Thagaste.  There  is  more  air  and 
light  and  space.  If  the  plantation  is  sparse,  the 
beautiful  shape  of  the  land  may  be  observed  all 
the  better.  Nothing  breaks  or  lessens  the  grand 
effects  of  the  light.  .  .  .  And  let  no  one  say  that 
Augustin's  eyes  cared  not  for  all  that,  he  who  wrote 
after  his  conversion,  and  in  all  the  austerity  of  his 


50  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

repentance  :    "If  sentient  things  had  not  a  soul, 
we  should  not  love  them  so  much." 

It  is  here,  between  Madaura  and  Thagaste, 
during  the  eager  years  of  youth,  that  he  gathered 
together  the  seeds  of  sensations  and  images  which, 
later  on,  were  to  burst  forth  into  fiery  and  boiling 
metaphors  in  the  Confessions,  and  in  his  homilies  and 
paraphrases  of  Holy  Scripture.  Later  on,  he  will 
not  have  the  time  to  observe,  or  he  will  have  lost 
the  power.  Rhetoric  will  stretch  its  commonplace 
veil  between  him  and  the  unceasing  springtide  of 
the  earth.  Ambition  will  turn  him  away  from  those 
sights  which  reveal  themselves  only  to  hearts  un- 
selfish and  indifferent.  Then,  later  on.  Faith  will 
seize  hold  of  him  to  the  exclusion  of  all  else.  He 
will  no  longer  perceive  the  creation  save  at  odd 
moments  in  a  kind  of  metaphysical  dream,  and,  so 
to  speak,  across  the  glory  of  the  Creator.  But  in 
these  youthful  years  all  things  burst  upon  him  with 
extraordinary  violence  and  ecstasy.  His  undulled 
senses  swallowed  greedily  the  whole  banquet  offered 
by  this  wide  world  to  his  hunger  for  pleasure.  The 
fugitive  beauty  of  things  and  beings,  with  all  their 
charms,  revealed  itself  to  him  in  its  newness  : 
novissimarum  rerum  fugaces  pulchritudines,  earumque 
suavitates.  This  craving  for  sensation  will  still  exist 
in  the  great  Christian  teacher,  and  betray  itself  in 
the  warm  and  coloured  figures  of  his  style.  Of 
course,  he  was  not  as  a  worldty  describer,  who 
studies  to  produce  phrases  which  present  an  image, 
or  arranges  glittering  pictures — all  such  endeavours 
he  knew  nothing  about.  But  by  instinct,  and  thanks 
to  his  warm  African  temperament,  he  was  a  kind  of 
impressionist  and  metaphysical  poet. 


THE   SCHOOLBOY   OF  MAD  AURA        51 

If  the  rural  landscape  of  Thagaste  is  reflected  in 
certain   passages — the   pleasantest   and   most   well 
known — of  the  Confessions,  all  the  intellectual  part 
of  Augustin's  work  finds  its  symbolical  commentary 
here  in  this  arid  and  light-splashed  plain  of  Ma- 
daura.     Like  it,   the  thought  of  Augustin  has  no  i 
shadows.     Like  it  too,  it  is  lightened  by  strange  and  \ 
splendid  tints  which  seem  to  come  from  far  off, 
from  a  focal  fire  invisible  to  human  eyes.    No  modern 
writer  has  better  praised  the  light — not  only  the 
immortal    light    of    the    blessed,    but    that    fight 
which  rests  on  the  African  fields,  and  is  on  land  and 
sea  ;  and  nobody  has  spoken  of  it  with  more  ampli- 
tude and  wonder.    The  truth  is,  that  in  no  country 
in  the  world,  not  even  in  Egypt,  in  the  rose-coloured 
lands  of  Karnak  and  Luxor,  is  the  light  more  pure 
and  admirable  than  in  these  great  bare  plains  of 
Numidia  and  the  region  of  the  Sahara.    Is  there  not 
enchantment  for  the  eyes  of  the  metaphysician  in  ^ 
this    play    of    light,    these    nameless     interfulgent  ' 
colours  which  appear  flimsy  as  the  play  of  thought  ?  ' 
For  the  glowing  floating  haze  is  made  of  nothing 
— of  lines,  of  gleam,  of  unregulated  splendour.    And 
all  this   triumph   of   fluctuating  light   and   elusive 
colour  is  quenched  with  the  sun,   smoulders  into  > 
darkness,  even  as  ideas  in  the  obscure  depths  of 
the  intelligence  which  reposes.  .  .  . 

Not  less  than  this  land,  stern  even  to  sadness, 
but  hot  and  sumptuous,  the  town  of  Madaura  must 
have  impressed  Augustin. 

It  was  an  old  Numidian  city,  proud  of  its  an- 
tiquity. Long  before  the  Roman  conquest,  it  had 
been  a  fortress  of  King  Syphax.  Afterwards,  the 
conquerors  settled  there,  and  in  the  second  century 


52  SAINT   AUGUSTIN 

of  our  era,  Apuleius,  the  most  famous  of  its  chil- 
dren, could  state  before  a  proconsul,  not  without 
pride,  that  Madaura  was  a  very  prosperous  colony. 
It  is  probable  that  this  old  town  was  not  so  much 
Romanized  as  its  neighbours,  Thimgad  and  Lam- 
besa,  which  were  of  recent  foundation  and  had  been 
built  all  at  once  by  decree  of  the  Government. 
But  it  may  well  have  been  as  Roman  as  Theveste, 
a  no  less  ancient  city,  where  the  population  was 
probably  just  as  mixed.  Madaura,  like  Theveste, 
had  its  temples  with  pillars  and  Corinthian  porticoes, 
its  triumphal  arches  (these  were  run  up  everywhere), 
its  forum  surrounded  by  a  covered  gallery  and  peopled 
with  statues.  Statues  also  were  very  liberally  dis- 
tributed in  those  days.  We  know  of  at  least  three 
at  Madaura  which  Augustin  mentions  in  one  of  his 
letters  :  A  god  Mars  in  his  heroic  nakedness,  and 
another  Mars  armed  from  head  to  foot ;  opposite, 
the  statue  of  a  man,  in  realistic  style,  stretching 
out  three  fingers  to  neutralize  the  evil  eye.  These 
familiar  figures  remained  very  clear  in  the  recollec- 
tion of  Augustin.  In  the  evening,  or  at  the  hour 
of  the  siesta,  he  had  stretched  himself  under  their 
pedestals  and  played  at  dice  or  bones  in  the  cool 
shade  of  the  god  Mars,  or  of  the  Man  with  out- 
stretched fingers.  The  slabs  of  marble  of  the 
portico  made  a  good  place  to  play  or  sleep. 

Among  these  statues,  there  was  one  perhaps 
which  interested  the  lad  and  stimulated  all  his  early 
ambitions — that  of  Apuleius,  the  great  man  of 
Madaura,  the  orator,  philosopher,  sorcerer,  who 
was  spoken  of  from  one  end  to  the  other  of  Africa. 
By  dint  of  gazing  at  this,  and  listening  to  the 
praises   of  the  great  local  author,   did  the  young 


THE   SCHOOLBOY   OF   MADAURA        53 

scholar  become  aware  of  his  vocation  ?  Did  he 
have  from  this  time  a  confused  sort  of  wish  to 
become  one  day  another  Apuleius,  a  Christian 
Apuleius — to  surpass  the  reputation  of  this  cele- 
brated pagan  ?  These  impressions  and  admirations 
of  youth  have  always  a  more  or  less  direct  influence 
upon  what  use  a  boy  makes  of  his  talents. 

Be  that  as  it  will,  Augustin  could  not  take  a 
step  in  Madaura  without  running  against  the 
legend  of  Apuleius,  who  was  become  almost  a 
divinity  for  his  fellow-countrymen.  He  was  looked 
upon  not  only  as  a  sage,  but  as  a  most  wily  nigro- 
mancer.  The  pagans  compared  him  to  Christ — nay, 
put  him  higher  than  Christ.  In  their  view  he  had 
worked  much  more  astonishing  miracles  than  those 
of  Jesus  or  of  Apollonius  of  Tyana.  And  people 
told  the  extravagant  stories  out  of  his  Meta- 
morphoses as  real,  as  having  actually  happened. 
Nothing  was  seen  on  all  sides  but  wizards,  men 
changed  into  animals,  animals,  or  men  and  women, 
under  some  spell.  In  the  inns,  a  man  watched 
with  a  suspicious  look  the  ways  of  the  maid- 
servant who  poured  out  his  drink  or  handed 
him  a  dish.  Perhaps  some  magic  potion  was 
mingled  with  the  cheese  or  bread  that  she  was 
laying  on  the  table.  It  was  an  atmosphere  of 
feverish  and  delirious  credulity.  The  pagan  mad- 
ness got  the  better  of  the  Christians  themselves. 
Augustin,  who  had  lived  in  this  atmosphere,  will 
later  find  considerable  trouble  in  maintaining  his 
strong  common  sense  amid  such  an  overflow  of 
marvels. 

For  the  moment,  the  fantasy  of  tales  filled  him 
with  at  least  as  much  enthusiasm  as  the  super- 


54  SAINT   AUGUSTIN 

natural.  At  Madaura  he  lived  in  a  miraculous 
world,  where  everything  charmed  his  senses  and 
his  mind,  and  everything  stimulated  his  precocious 
instinct  for  Beauty. 

More  than  Thagaste,  no  doubt,  Madaura  bore  the 
marks  of  the  building  genius  of  the  Romans.  Even 
to-day  their  descendants,  the  Italians,  are  the 
masons  of  the  world,  after  having  been  the  archi- 
tects. The  Romans  were  the  building  nation  above 
all  others.  They  it  was  who  raised  and  established 
towns  upon  the  same  model  and  according  to  the 
same  ideal  as  an  oration  or  a  poem.  They  really 
invented  the  house,  mansio,  not  only  the  shelter 
where  one  lives,  but  the  building  which  itself  lives, 
which  triumphs  over  years  and  centuries,  a  huge 
construction  ornamental  and  sightly,  existing  as 
much — and  perhaps  more — for  the  delight  of  the 
eyes  as  for  usefulness.  The  house,  the  Town- 
with-deep-streets,  perfectly  ordered,  were  a  great 
matter  of  amazement  for  the  African  nomad — he 
who  passes  and  never  settles  down  anywhere.  He 
hated  them,  doubtless,  as  the  haunts  of  the  soldier 
and  the  publican,  his  oppressors,  but  he  also  re- 
garded them  with  admiration  mixed  with  jealousy 
as  the  true  expression  of  a  race  which,  when  it 
entered  a  country,  planted  itself  for  eternity,  and 
claimed  to  join  magnificence  and  beauty  to  the 
manifestation  of  its  strength.  The  Roman  ruins 
which  are  scattered  over  modern  Algeria  humiliate 
ourselves  by  their  pomp — us  who  flatter  ourselves 
that  we  are  resuming  the  work  of  the  Empire  and 
continuing  its  tradition.  They  are  a  permanent 
reproach  to  our  mediocrity,  a  continual  incitement 
to  grandeur  and  beauty.     Of  course,  the  Roman 


THE  SCHOOLBOY  OF  MADAURA       55 

architecture  could  not  have  had  on  Augustin,  this 
still  unformed  young  African,  the  same  effect  as 
it  has  to-day  on  a  Frenchman  or  a  man  from 
Northern  Europe.  But  it  is  certain  that  it  formed, 
without  his  knowledge,  his  thought  and  his  power 
of  sensation,  and  extended  for  him  the  lessons  of  the 
Latin  rhetoricians  and  grammarians. 

All  that  was  not  exactly  very  Christian.  But  ( 
from  these  early  school  years  Augustin  got  further 
and  further  away  from  Christianity,  and  the  ex- 
amples he  had  under  his  eyes  at  Madaura  were 
hardly  likely  to  strengthen  him  in  his  faith.  It  was 
hardly  an  edifying  atmosphere  there  for  a  Catholic 
youth  who  had  a  lively  imagination,  a  pleasure-loving 
temperament,  and  who  liked  pagan  literature.  The 
greatest  part  of  the  population  were  pagans,  especi- 
ally among  the  aristocrats.  The  Decurions  continued 
to  preside  at  festivals  in  honour  of  the  old  idols. 

These  festivals  were  frequent.  The  least  excuse 
was  taken  to  engarland  piously  the  doors  of  houses 
with  branches,  to  bleed  the  sacrificial  pig,  or  slaugh- 
ter the  lamb.  In  the  evening,  squares  and  street 
corners  were  illuminated.  Little  candles  burned  on 
all  the  thresholds.  During  the  mysteries  of  Bacchus, 
the  town  councillors  themselves  headed  the  popular 
rejoicings.  It  was  an  African  carnival,  brutal  and 
full  of  colour.  People  got  tipsy,  pretended  they 
were  mad.  For  the  sport  of  the  thing,  they  as- 
saulted the  passers  and  robbed  them.  The  dull 
blows  on  tambourines,  the  hysterical  and  nasal 
preludes  of  the  flutes,  excited  an  immense  elation, 
at  once  sensual  and  mystic.  And  all  quieted  down 
among  the  cups  and  leather  flagons  of  wine,  the 
grease   and   meats  of   banquets   in   the   open   air. 


56  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

Even  in  a  country  as  sober  as  Africa,  the  pagan 
feasts  were  never  much  else  than  excuses  for  gorging 
and  orgies.  Augustin,  who  after  his  conversion 
had  only  sarcasms  for  the  carnival  of  Madaura, 
doubtless  went  with  the  crowd,  hke  many  other 
Christians.  Rich  and  influential  people  gave  the 
example.  There  was  danger  of  annoying  them  by 
making  a  group  apart.  And  then,  there  was  no 
resisting  the  agreeableness  of  such  festivals. 

Perhaps  he  was  even  brought  to  these  love-feasts 
by  those  in  whose  charge  he  was.  For,  in  fact,  to 
whom  had  he  been  entrusted  ?  Doubtless  to  some 
host  of  Patricius,  a  pagan  Hke  himself.  Or  did 
he  lodge  with  his  master,  a  grammarian,  who  kept 
a  boarding-house  for  the  boys  ?  Almost  all  these 
j  schoolmasters  were  pagan  too.  Is  it  wonderful 
)  that  the  Christian  lessons  of  Monnica  and  the  nurses 
at  Thagaste  became  more  and  more  blurred  in 
Augustin's  mind  ?  Many  years  after,  an  old 
Madaura  grammarian,  called  Maximus,  wrote  to 
him  in  a  tone  of  loving  reproach  :  "  Thou  hast 
drawn  away  from  us ' ' — a  secta  nostra  deviasH.  Did 
he  wish  to  hint  that  at  this  time  Augustin  had 
glided  into  paganism  ?  Nothing  is  more  unlikely. 
He  himself  assures  us  that  the  name  of  Christ 
remained  always  "  graven  on  his  heart."  But 
while  he  was  at  Madaura  he  lived  indifferently  with 
pagans  and  Christians. 

Besides  that,  the  teaching  he  got  was  altogether 

I    pagan  in  tone.     No  doubt   he  picked   out,  as  he 

j    always  did,  the  subjects  which  suited  him.     Minds 

'    such  as  his   fling  themselves  upon  that   which  is 

likely  to  nourish  them  :    they  throw  aside  all  the 

rest,  or  suffer  it  very  unwillingly.     Thus  Augustin 


THE   SCHOOLBOY   OF   MADAURA        57 

never  wavered  in  his  dislike  for  Greek  :  he  was  a 
poor  Greek  scholar.  He  detested  the  Greeks  by 
instinct.  According  to  Western  prejudice,  these 
men  of  the  East  were  all  rascals  or  amusers. 
Augustin,  as  a  practical  African,  always  regarded 
the  Greeks  as  vain,  discoursing  wits.  In  a  word, 
they  were  not  sincere  people  whom  it  would  be  safe 
to  trust.  The  entirely  local  patriotism  of  the  classical  j 
Greek  authors  further  annoyed  this  Roman  citizen 
who  was  used  to  regard  the  world  as  his  country : 
he  thought  them  very  narrow-minded  to  take  so 
much  interest  in  the  history  of  some  little  town. 
As  for  him,  he  looked  higher  and  farther.  It  must 
be  remembered  that  in  the  second  half  of  the  fourth 
centur}^  the  Greek  attitude,  broadened  and  fully 
conscious  of  itself,  set  itself  more  and  more  against 
Latinism,  above  all,  politically.  There  it  lay,  a 
hostile  and  impenetrable  block  before  the  Western 
peoples.  And  here  was  a  stronger  reason  for  a 
Romanized  African  to  dislike  the  Greeks. 

So  he  painfully  construed  the  Iliad  and  Odyssey, 
very  cross  at  the  difficulties  of  a  foreign  language 
which  prevented  him  from  grasping  the  plots  of  the 
fine,  fabulous  narratives.  There  were,  however, 
abridgments  used  in  the  schools,  a  kind  of  sum- 
maries of  the  Trojan  War,  written  by  Latin  gram- 
marians under  the  odd  pseudonyms  of  Dares  the 
Phrygian  and  Dictys  of  Crete.  But  these  abridg- 
ments were  very  dry  for  an  imagination  like 
Augustin's.  He  much  preferred  the  Mneid,  the 
poem  admired  above  all  by  the  Africans,  on  account 
of  the  episode  devoted  to  the  foundation  of  Carthage. 
Virgil  was  his  passion.  He  read  and  re-read  him 
continually  ;    he  knew  him  by  heart.     To  the  end 


58  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

of  his  life,  in  his  severest  writings,  he  quoted  verses 
or  whole  passages  out  of  his  much-loved  poet. 
Dido's  adventure  moved  him  to  tears.  They  had 
to  pluck  the  book  out  of  his  hands. 

Now  the  reason  is  that  there  was  a  secret  harmony 
between  Virgil's  soul  and  the  soul  of  Augustin. 
Both  were  gracious  and  serious.  One,  the  great 
poet,  and  one,  the  humble  schoolboy,  they  both 
had  pity  on  the  Queen  of  Carthage,  they  would 
have  liked  to  save  her,  or  at  any  rate  to  mitigate 
her  sadness,  to  alter  a  little  the  callousness  of  ^Eneas 
and  the  harshness  of  the  Fates.  But  think  of  it  ! 
Love  is  a  divine  sickness,  a  chastisement  sent  by 
the  gods.  It  is  just,  when  all's  said,  that  the 
guilty  one  should  endure  her  agony  to  the  very  end. 
And  then,  such  very  great  things  are  going  to  arise 
out  of  this  poor  love  !  Upon  it  depends  the  lot  of  two 
Empires.  What  counts  a  woman  before  Rome  and 
Carthage  ?  Besides,  she  was  bound  to  perish  : 
the  gods  had  decreed  it.  .  .  .  There  was  in  all  that 
a  concentrated  emotion,  a  depth  of  sentiment,  a 
religious  appeal  which  stirred  Augustin's  heart, 
still  unaware  of  itself.  This  obedience  of  the 
Virgilian  hero  to  the  heavenly  will,  was  already  an 
adumbration  of  the  humility  of  the  future  Chris- 
tian. 

Certainly,  Augustin  did  not  perceive  very  plainly 
in  these  turbid  years  of  his  youth  the  full  religious 
significance  of  Virgil's  poem.  Carried  away  by  his 
headstrong  nature,  he  yielded  to  the  heart-rending 
charm  of  the  romantic  story  :  he  lived  it,  literally, 
with  the  heroine.  When  his  schoolmasters  desired 
him  to  elaborate  the  lament  of  the  dying  Queen 
Dido  in  Latin  prose,  what  he  wrote  had  a  veritable 


THE   SCHOOLBOY   OF  MADAURA        59 

quiver  of  anguish.  Without  the  least  defence 
against  lust  and  the  delusions  of  the  heart,  he  spent 
intellectually  and  in  a  single  outburst  all  the 
strength  of  passion. 

He  absorbed  every  love-poem  with  the  eagerness 
of  a  participating  soul.  If  he  took  pleasure  in  the 
licentiousness  of  Plautus  and  Terence,  if  he  read 
delightfully  those  comedies  wherein  the  worst  weak- 
nesses are  excused  and  glorified,  I  believe  that  he 
took  still  more  pleasure  in  the  Latin  Elegiacs  who 
present  without  any  shame  the  romantic  madness 
of  Alexandrine  love.  For  what  sing  these  poets 
even  to  weariness,  unless  it  be  that  no  one  can 
resist  the  Cyprian  goddess,  that  life  has  no  other 
end  but  love  ?  Love  for  itself,  to  love  for  the  sake 
of  loving — there  is  the  constant  subject  of  these 
sensualists,  of  Catullus,  Propertius,  Tibullus,  Ovid. 
After  the  story  of  Dido,  the  youthful  reader  was 
ravished  by  the  story  of  Ariadne,  even  more  disturb- 
ing, because  no  remorse  modifies  the  frenzy  of  it. 
He  read  : 

Now  while  the  careless  hero  flees,  heating  the  wave  i^\^\^\ 
with  his  oars  and  casting  to  the  gales  of  the  open  sea 
his  idle  promises, — there,  standing  among  the  shingle 
of  the  beach,  the  daughter  of  Minos  follows  him, 
alas !  with  her  beautiful  sad  eyes  :  she  stares, 
astonied,  like  to  a  Bacchante  changed  into  a  statue. 
She  looks  forth,  and  her  heart  floats  upon  the  great 
waves  of  her  grief.  She  lets  slip  from  her  head  her 
fine-spun  coif,  she  tears  away  the  thin  veils  which 
cover  her  bosom,  and  the  smooth  cincture  which  sup- 
ports her  quivering  breasts.  All  that  slips  from  her 
body  into  the  salt  foam  which  ripples  round  her  feet. 


6o  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

But  little  she  cares  for  her  coif  or  for  her  apparel 
carried  away  by  the  tide  !  Lost,  bewildered,  with  all 
her  heart  and  all  her  soul,  she  is  clinging  to  thee, 
0  Theseus. 

And  if  Augustin,  when  he  had  read  these  burning 

verses  of  Catullus,  looked  through  the  Anthologies 

which  were  popular  in  the  African  schools,  he  would 

y^       come   upon   "  The  JVigil  of  Venus,"   that   eclogue 

y       which  ends  with  such  a  passionate  cry  : 

0  my  springtime,  when  wilt  thou  come  ?  When 
shall  I  be  as  the  swallow  ?  When  shall  I  cease  to 
be  silent  ?  .  .  .  May  he  love  to-morrow,  he  who 
has  not  loved  yet.  And  he  who  has  already  loved, 
may  he  love  again  to-morrow. 

Imagine  the  effect  of  such  exhortations  on  a 
youth  of  fifteen  !  Truly,  this  springtide  of  love, 
which  the  poet  cries  for  in  his  distress,  the  son  of 
Monnica  knew  well  was  come  for  him.  How  he 
must  have  listened  to  the  musical  and  melancholy 
counsellor  who  told  his  pain  to  the  leaves  of  the 
book !  What  stimulant  and  what  food  for  his 
boyish  longings  and  dreams  !  And  what  a  divine 
chorus  of  beauties  the  great  love-heroines  of  ancient 
epic  and  elegy,   Helen,   Medea,   Ariadne,   Phaedra, 

^  formed  and  re-formed  continually  in  his  dazzled 
memory  !    When  we  of  to-day  read  such  verses  at 

I  Augustin's  age,  some  bitterness  is  mixed  with  our 
delight.  These  heroes  and  heroines  are  too  far 
from  us.  These  almost  chimerical  beings  withdraw 
from  us  into  outlying  lands,  to  a  vanished  world 
which  will  never  come  again.     But  for  Augustin, 


THE   SCHOOLBOY   OF   MADAURA       6i 

this  was  the  world  he  was  born  into — it  was  his 
pagan  Africa  where  pleasure  was  the  whole  of  life, 
and  one  lived  only  for  the  lusts  of  the  flesh.  And 
the  race  of  fabulous  princesses — they  were  not  dead, 
those  ladies  :  they  were  ever  waiting  for  the  well- 
beloved  in  the  palaces  at  Carthage.  Yes,  the 
scholar  of  Madaura  lived  wonderful  hours,  dreaming 
thus  of  love  between  the  pages  of  the  poets.  These 
young  dreams  before  love  comes  are  more  bewitch- 
ing than  love  itself :  a  whole  unknown  world 
suddenty  discovered  and  entered  with  a  quivering 
joy  of  discovery  at  each  step.  The  unused 
strength  of  illusion  appears  inexhaustible,  space 
becomes  deeper  and  the  heart  more  strong.  .  .  . 

A  long  time  afterwards,  when,  recovered  from  all 
that,  Augustin  speaks  to  us  of  the  Divine  love,  he 
will  know  fully  the  infinite  value  of  it  from  having 
gone  through  all  the  painful  entrancements  of  the 
other.  And  he  will  say  to  us,  with  the  sureness  of 
experience  :  "  The  pleasure  of  the  human  heart  in 
the  light  of  truth  and  the  abundance  of  wisdom — 
yea,  the  pleasure  of  the  human  heart,  of  the  faithful 
heart,  and  of  the  heart  which  is  holy,  stands  alone. 
You  will  find  nothing  in  any  voluptuousness  fit  to 
be  compared  to  it.  I  say  not  that  this  other  pleasure 
is  less,  for  that  which  is  called  less  hath  only  to  in- 
crease to  become  equal.  No,  I  shall  not  say  that  all 
other  pleasure  is  less.  No  comparison  can  be  made. 
It  is  another  kind,  it  is  another  realitv." 


VI 

THE   HOLIDAYS   AT  THAGASTE 

IN  the  city  of  Apuleius,  the  Christian  Monnica's 
son  became  simply  a  pagan.  He  was  near  his 
sixteenth  year  :  the  awkward  time  of  early  virility 
was  beginning  for  him.  Prepared  at  Madaura,  it 
suddenly  burst  out  at  Thagaste. 

Augustin  came  back  to  his  parents,  no  doubt 
during  the  vacation.  But  this  vacation  lasted 
perhaps  a  whole  year.  He  had  come  to  the  end  of 
his  juvenile  studies.  The  grammarians  at  Madaura 
could  teach  him  nothing  more.  To  round  off  his 
acquirements,  it  would  be  necessary  to  attend  the 
lectures  of  some  well-known  rhetorician.  Now 
there  were  very  good  rhetoricians  only  at  Carthage. 
Besides,  it  was  a  fashion,  and  point  of  honour,  for 
Numidian  families  to  send  their  sons  to  finish  their 
education  in  the  provincial  capital.  Patricius  was 
most  eager  to  do  this  for  his  son,  who  at  Madaura 
had  shewn  himself  a  very  brilliant  pupil  and  ought 
not  therefore  to  be  pulled  up  half-way  down  the 
course.  But  the  life  of  a  student  cost  a  good  deal, 
and  Patricius  had  no  money.  His  affairs  were 
always  muddled.  He  was  obliged  to  wait  for  the 
rents  from  his  farms,  to  grind  down  his  tenants,  and, 
ultimately,  despairing  of  any  other  way  out  of  it, 
to  ask  for  an  advance  of  money  from  a  rich  patron. 
That  needed  time  and  diplomacy. 

Days  and  months  went  by,  and  Augustin,  with 
nothing  to  do,  joined  in  with  easily-made  friends 

62 


THE   HOLIDAYS   AT  THAGASTE        63 

and  gave  himself  up  to  the  pleasures  of  his  time  of 
life,  like  all  the  young  townsmen  of  Thagaste — 
pleasures  rather  rough  and  little  various,  such  as 
were  to  be  got  in  a  little  free-town  of  those  days, 
and  as  they  have  remained  for  the  natives  of  to-day, 
whether  they  live  a  town  or  country  life.  To  hunt, 
to  ride  horseback,  to  play  at  games  of  chance,  to 
drink,  eat,  and  make  love — the^^  wanted  nothing 
beyond  that.  When  Augustin  in  his  Confessions 
accuses  himself  of  his  youthful  escapades  he  uses 
the  most  scathing  language.  He  speaks  of  them 
with  horror  and  disgust.  Once  more  we  are  tempted 
to  believe  that  he  exaggerates  through  an  excess  of 
Christian  remorse.  There  are  even  some  who,  put 
on  their  guard  by  this  vehement  tone,  have  questioned 
the  historical  value  of  the  Confessions.  They  argue 
that  when  the  Bishop  of  Hippo  wrote  these  things 
his  views  and  feelings  had  altered.  He  could  no 
longer  judge  with  the  same  eye  and  in  the  same 
spirit  the  happenings  of  his  youth.  All  this  is  only 
too  certain  :  when  he  wrote,  it  was  as  a  Christian  he 
judged  himself,  and  not  as  a  cold  historian  who 
refuses  to  go  beyond  the  brutal  fact.  He  tried  to 
unravel  the  origin  and  to  trace  the  consequences  of 
the  humblest  of  his  actions,  because  this  is  of  the 
highest  importance  for  salvation.  But  however 
severe  his  judgment  may  be,  it  does  not  impair  the 
reality  of  the  fact  itself.  Moreover,  in  natures 
like  his,  acts  which  others  would  hardly  think 
of  have  a  vibration  out  of  all  proportion  with 
the  act  itself.  The  evil  of  sin  depends  upon  the 
consciousness  of  the  sin  and  the  pleasure  taken  in  it. 
Augustin  was  very  intelligent  and  very  sensual. 
In  any  case,  3^oung  Africans  develop  early,  and 


64  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

the  lechery  of  the  race  is  proverbial.  It  must 
have  been  a  good  deal  stronger  at  a  time  when 
Christianity  still  had  to  fight  against  pagan  slack- 
ness in  these  matters,  ere  Islam  had  imposed  its 
hypocritical  austerity  upon  the  general  conduct. 
There  is  even  room  for  wonder  that  in  Augustin's  case 
this  crisis  of  development  did  not  happen  earlier  than 
his  sixteenth  year.  It  seems  that  it  was  only  more 
violent.  In  what  language  he  describes  it  !  "I 
dared  to  roam  the  woods  and  pursue  my  vagrant 
loves  beneath  the  shade."  But  he  was  not  yet  in 
love — this  he  points  out  himself.  In  his  case  then 
it  was  simple  lust.  "  From  the  quagmire  of  con- 
cupiscence, from  the  well  of  puberty,  exhaled  a  mist 
which  clouded  and  befogged  my  heart,  so  that  I 
could  not  distinguish  between  the  clear  shining  of 
affection  and  the  darkness  of  lust.  ...  I  could  not 
keep  within  the  kingdom  of  light,  where  friendship 
binds  soul  to  soul.  .  .  .  And  so  I  polluted  the  brook 
of  friendship  with  the  sewage  of  lust. ' '  Let  us  not  try 
to  make  it  clearer  than  he  has  left  it  himself.  When 
one  thinks  of  all  the  African  vices,  one  dare  not  dwell 
upon  such  avowals.  *'  Lord,"  he  says,  "  I  was  loath- 
some in  Thy  sight."  And  with  pitiless  justice  he 
analyses  the  effect  of  the  evil :  "It  stormed  con- 
fusedly within  me,  whirling  my  thoughtless  youth  over 
the  precipices  of  desire.  And  I  wandered  still  further 
from  Thee,  and  Thou  didst  leave  me  to  myself  ;  the 
torrent  of  my  fornications  tossed  and  swelled  and 
boiled  and  ran  over."  And  during  this  time  : 
"  Thou  saidst  nothing,  O  my  God  !  "  This  silence 
of  God  is  the  terrible  sign  of  hardened  sin,  of  hope- 
less damnation.  It  meant  utter  depravity  of  the 
will ;  he  did  not  even  feel  remorse  any  more. 


THE  HOLIDAYS   AT  THAGASTE        65 

Here  he  is,  then,  as  if  unfastened  from  his  child's 
soul — separated  from  himself.  The  object  of  his 
youthful  faith  has  no  more  meaning  for  him.  He 
understands  no  longer,  and  it  is  all  one  to  him  that 
he  does  not.  Thus,  told  by  himself,  does  this  first 
crisis  of  Augustin's  life  emerge  from  the  auto- 
biography ;  and  it  takes  on  a  general  significance. 
Once  for  all,  under  a  definite  form,  and  to  a  certain 
degree  classic,  he  has  diagnosed  with  his  subtle 
experience  of  doctor  of  souls  the  pubescent  crisis  in 
all  young  men  of  his  age,  in  all  the  young  Christians 
who  are  to  come  after  him.  For  the  story  of 
Augustin  is  the  story  of  each  of  us.  The  loss  of 
faith  always  occurs  when  the  senses  first  awaken. 
At  this  critical  moment,  when  nature  claims  us  for 
her  service,  the  consciousness  of  spiritual  things  is, 
in  most  cases,  either  eclipsed  or  totally  destroyed. 
The  gradual  usage  to  the  brutalities  of  the  instinct 
ends  by  killing  the  sensitiveness  of  the  inward 
feelings.  It  is  not  reason  which  turns  the  young 
man  from  God  ;  it  is  the  flesh.  Scepticism  but  pro- 
vides him  with  excuses  for  the  new  life  he  is  leading. 

Thus  started,  Augustin  was  not  able  to  pull  up 
half-way  on  the  road  of  pleasure  ;  he  never  did 
anything  by  halves.  In  these  vulgar  revels  of 
the  ordinary  wild  youth,  he  wanted  again  to  be 
best,  he  wanted  to  be  first  as  he  was  at  school.  He 
stirred  up  his  companions  and  drew  them  after  him. 
They  in  their  turn  drew  him.  Among  them  was 
found  that  Alypius,  who  was  the  friend  of  all  his  hfe, 
who  shared  his  faults  and  mistakes,  who  followed 
him  even  in  his  conversion,  and  became  Bishop  of 
Thagaste.  These  two  future  shepherds  of  Christ 
roamed  the  streets  with  the  lost  sheep.    They  spent 


66  SAINT   AUGUSTIN 

the  nights  in  the  open  spaces  of  the  town,  playing,  or 
wantonly  dreaming  before  cups  of  cool  drinks.  The}^ 
lounged  there,  stretched  out  on  mats,  with  a  crown  of 
leaves  on  the  head,  a  jasmine  garland  round  the 
neck,  a  rose  or  marigold  thrust  above  the  ear.  They 
never  knew  what  to  do  next  to  kill  time.  So  one 
fine  evening  the  reckless  crew  took  it  into  their 
heads  to  rifle  a  pear  tree  of  one  of  Patricius's  neigh- 
bours. This  pear  tree  was  just  beyond  the  vineyard 
belonging  to  Augustin's  father.  The  rascals  shook 
down  the  pears.  They  took  a  few  bites  to  find  out 
the  taste,  and  having  decided  this  to  be  rather 
disappointing,  they  chucked  all  the  rest  to  the  hogs. 
In  this  theft,  done  merely  for  the  pleasure  of  the 
thing,  Augustin  sees  an  evidence  of  diabolical  mis- 
chief. Doubtless  he  committed  many  another 
misdeed  where,  like  this,  the  whole  attraction  lay 
in  the  Satanic  joy  of  breaking  the  law.  His  fury 
for  dissolute  courses  knew  no  rest.  Did  Monnica 
observe  anything  of  this  change  in  Augustin  ?  The 
boy,  grown  big,  had  escaped  from  the  supervision 
of  the  women's  apartments.  If  the  mother  guessed 
anything,  she  did  not  guess  all.  It  fell  to  her  husband 
to  open  her  eyes.  With  the  freedom  of  manners 
among  the  ancients,  Augustin  relates  the  fact  quite 
plainly.  .  .  .  That  took  place  in  the  bath-buildings 
at  Thagaste.  He  was  bathing  with  his  father, 
probably  in  the  piscina  of  cold  baths.  The  bathers 
who  came  out  of  the  water  with  dripping  limbs 
were  printing  wet  marks  of  their  feet  upon  the 
mosaic  flooring,  when  Patricius,  who  was  watching 
them,  suddenly  perceived  that  his  son  had  about 
him  the  signs  of  manhood,  that  he  was  already 
bearing — as  Augustin  says  himself  in  his  picturesque 


THE   HOLIDAYS   AT  THAGASTE         67 

language — the  first  signs  of  turbulent  youth,  like 
another  toga  praetexta.  Patricius,  as  a  good  pagan, 
welcomed  with  jubilation  this  promise  of  grand- 
children, and  rushed  off  joyously  to  brag  of  his 
discovery  to  Monnica.  She  took  the  news  in  quite 
another  way.  Frightened  at  the  idea  of  the  dangers 
to  which  her  son's  virtue  was  exposed,  she  lectured 
him  in  private.  But  Augustin,  from  the  height  of 
his  sixteen  years,  laughed  at  her.  "A  lot  of  old- 
women's  gossip  !  Why  does  she  want  to  talk 
about  things  she  can't  understand  !  .  .  .  "  Tired 
out  at  last,  Monnica  tried  to  get  a  promise  from  her  i 
son  that  he  would  at  least  have  some  restraint  in  his 
dissipation — that  he  would  avoid  women  of  the 
town,  and  above  all,  that  he  would  have  nothing  to 
do  with  married  women.  For  the  rest,  she  put  him 
in  God's  hands. 

It  may  be  wondered — Augustin  himself  wonders — 
that  she  did  not  think  of  finding  him  a  wife.  They 
marry  early  in  Africa.  Even  now  any  Arab  labourer 
buys  a  wife  for  his  son,  hardly  turned  sixteen,  so 
that  the  fires  of  a  too  warm  youth  may  be  quenched 
in  marriage.  But  Monnica,  who  was  not  yet  a  saint, 
acted  in  this  matter  like  a  foreseeing  and  practical 
woman  of  the  prosperous  class.  A  wife  would  be  a 
drag  for  a  young  man  like  Augustin,  who  seemed 
likely  to  have  such  a  brilliant  career.  A  too  early 
marriage  would  jeopardize  his  future.  Before  all 
things,  it  was  important  that  he  should  become  an 
illustrious  rhetorician,  and  raise  the  fortunes  of  the 
family.  For  her,  all  else  yielded  to  this  considera- 
tion. But  she  hoped  at  least  that  the  headstrong 
student  might  consent  to  be  good  into  the  bargain. 

This  was  also  Patricius's  way  of  looking  at  the 


68  SAINT   AUGUSTIN 

matter.  And  so,  says  Augustin,  "  My  father  gave 
himself  no  concern  how  I  grew  towards  Thee,  or 
how  chaste  I  was,  provided  only  that  I  became  a 
man  of  culture — however  destitute  of  Th}/  culture, 
O  God.  .  .  .  My  mother  and  he  slackened  the  curb 
without  regard  to  due  severity,  and  I  was  suffered 
to  enjoy  myself  according  to  my  dissolute  fancy." 
Meanwhile,  Patricius  was  now  become  (very  tardily) 
a  catechumen.  The  entreaties  of  his  wife  had  won 
him  to  the  Catholic  faith.  But  his  sentiments  were 
not  much  more  Christian — "  He  hardly  thought  of 
Thee,  my  God,"  acknowledges  his  son,  who  never- 
theless was  pleased  at  this  conversion.  If  Patricius 
decided  to  get  converted,  it  was  probably  from 
political  reasons.  Since  the  death  of  Julian  the 
Apostate,  paganism  appeared  finally  conquered.  The 
Emperor  Valentinianus  had  just  proclaimed  heavy 
penalties  against  night-sacrifices.  In  Africa,  the 
Count  Romanus  persecuted  the  Donatists.  All  the 
Christians  in  Thagaste  were  Catholic.  What  was 
the  good  of  keeping  up  a  useless  and  dangerous 
resistance  ?  Perhaps  the  end  of  Patricius — which 
was  near — was  as  edifying  as  Monnica  could  wish. 
But  at  all  events,  at  the  present  moment,  he  was  not 
the  man  to  interfere  with  Augustin's  pleasures  :  he 
only  thought  of  the  eventual  fortune  of  the  young 
man.  Alone,  Monnica  might  have  had  some  influ- 
ence on  him,  and  she  herself  was  fascinated  by  his 
future  career  in  the  world.  Perhaps,  to  quiet  her 
conscience,  she  said  to  herself  that  this  frivolous 
education  would  be  more  or  less  of  a  help  to  her  son 
towards  bringing  him  back  to  God,  that  a  day  would 
come  when  the  famous  rhetorician  would  plead  the 
cause  of  Christ  ?   ,  .  . 


THE  HOLIDAYS   AT  THAGASTE         69 

Scandalized  though  she  might  be  at  his  conduct, 
it  is  however  apparent  that  it  was  about  this  time 
she  began  to  get  fonder  of  him,  to  worry  over  him 
as  her  favourite  child.  But  it  was  not  till  much 
later  that  the  union  between  mother  and  son  became 
quite  complete.  Too  many  old  customs  still  re- 
mained preventing  close  intercourse  between  the 
men  and  women  of  a  family.  And  it  will  hardly  do 
to  picture  such  intimacy  from  the  intimacy  which 
may  exist  between  a  mother  and  son  of  our  own 
time.  There  was  none  of  the  spoiling,  or  indulgence, 
or  culpable  weakness  which  enervates  maternal 
tenderness  and  makes  it  injurious  to  the  energy  of  a 
manly  character.  Monnica  was  severe  and  a  little 
rough.  If  she  let  her  feelings  be  seen,  it  was  solely 
before  God.  And  yet  it  is  most  certain  that  in  the 
depth  of  her  heart  she  loved  Augustin,  not  only  as  a 
future  member  of  Christ,  but  humanly,  as  a  woman 
frustrated  of  love  in  a  badly  assorted  marriage  may 
spend  her  love  on  her  child.  The  brutality  of  pagan 
ways  revolted  her,  and  she  poured  on  this  young 
head  all  her  stored-up  affection.  In  Augustin  she  loved 
the  being  she  wished  she  could  love  in  her  husband. 

A  number  of  personal  considerations  were  no 
doubt  involved  in  the  deep  and  unselfish  attachment 
she  had  for  her  son  :  instinctively,  she  looked  for 
him  to  protect  her  against  the  father's  violence. 
She  felt  that  he  would  be  the  support  of  her  old  age, 
and  also,  she  foresaw  dimly  what  one  day  he  would 
be.  All  this  aided  to  bring  about  the  tie,  the  under- 
standing, which  grew  more  and  more  close  between 
Augustin  and  Monnica.  And  so  from  this  time  they 
both  appear  to  us  as  they  were  to  appear  to  all 
posterity — the  pattern  of  the  Christian  Mother  and 


70  SAINT   AUGUSTIN 

Son.  Thanks  to  them,  the  hard  law  of  the  ancients 
has  been  abrogated.  There  shall  be  no  more 
barriers  between  the  mother  and  her  child.  No 
longer  shall  it  be  vain  exterior  rites  which  draw 
together  the  members  of  the  same  family :  they  shall 
communicate  in  spirit  and  truth.  Heart  speaketh 
to  heart.  The  fellowship  of  souls  is  founded,  and  the 
ties  of  the  domestic  hearth  are  drawn  close,  as  they 
never  were  in  antiquity.  No  more  shall  they  work 
in  concert  only  for  material  things  ;  they  will  join 
together  to  love — and  to  love  each  other  more.  The 
son  will  belong  more  to  his  mother. 

At  the  time  we  have  now  come  to,  Monnica  was 
already  undertaking  .  the  conquest  of  Augustin's 
soul.  She  prayed  for  him  fervently.  The  young 
man  cared  very  little  :  gratitude  came  to  him  only 
after  his  conversion.  At  this  time  he  was  thinking  of 
nothing  but  amusement.  For  this  he  even  forgot 
his  career.  But  Monnica  and  Patricius  thought  of 
it  constantly — especially  Patricius,  who  gave  him- 
self enormous  trouble  to  enable  this  student  on  a 
hohday  to  finish  his  studies.  Eventually  he  got 
together  the  necessary  money,  possibly  borrowed 
enough  to  make  up  the  sum  from  some  rich  landowner 
who  was  the  patron  of  the  people  of  small  means  in 
Thagaste — say,  that  gorgeous  Romanianus,  to  whom 
Augustin,  in  acknowledgment,  dedicated  one  of  his 
first  books.  The  young  man  could  now  take  the 
road  for  Carthage. 

He  left  by  himself,  craving  for  knowledge  and 
glory  and  pleasure,  his  heart  full  of  longing  for  what 
he  knew  not,  and  melancholy  without  cause.  What 
was  going  to  become  of  him  in  the  great,  unknown 
citv  ? 


THE  SECOND  PART 
THE  ENCHANTMENT  OF  CARTHAGE 


Amare  et  amari. 
"To  love  and  to  be  loved." 

Confessio77s^  III,  i. 


4 


j 


CARTHAGO   VENERIS 

"  T  WENT  to  Carthage,  where  shameful  loves 
X  bubbled  round  me  like  boiling  oil." 
This  cry  of  repentance,  uttered  by  the  converted 
Augustin  twenty-five  years  later,  does  not  altogether 
stifle  his  words  of  admiration  for  the  old  capital  of 
his  country.  One  can  see  this  patriotic  admiration 
stirring  between  the  lines.  Carthage  made  a  very 
strong  impression  on  him.  He  gave  it  his  heart  and 
remained  faithful  to  the  end.  His  enemies,  the 
Donatists,  called  him  "  the  Carthaginian  arguer." 
After  he  became  Bishop  of  Hippo,  he  was  continually 
going  to  Carthage  to  preach,  or  dispute,  or  consult 
his  colleagues,  or  to  ask  something  from  men  in 
office.  When  he  is  not  there,  he  is  ever  speaking  of 
it  in  his  treatises  and  plain  sermons.  He  takes 
comparisons   from   it  :     "  You   who   have   been   to 

Carthage "  he  often  says  to  his  listeners.     For 

the  boy  from  little  Thagaste  to  go  to  Carthage,  was 
about  the  same  as  for  our  youths  from  the  provinces 
to  go  to  Paris.  Veni  Carthaginem — in  these  simple 
words  there  is  a  touch  of  naive  emphasis  which 
reveals  the  bewilderment  of  the  Numidian  student 
just  landed  in  the  great  city. 

And,  in  fact,  it  was  one  of  the  five  great  capitals 
of  the  Empire  :  there  were  Rome,  Constantinople, 
Antioch,  Alexandria — Carthage.     Carthage  was  the 

73 


74  SAINT   AUGUSTIN 

sea-port  capital  of  the  whole  western  Mediterranean. 
With  its  large  new  streets,  its  villas,  its  temples,  its 
palaces,  its  docks,  its  variously  dressed  cosmo- 
politan population,  it  astonished  and  delighted  the 
schoolboy  from  Madaura.  Whatever  local  marks 
were  left  about  him,  or  signs  of  the  rustic  simpleton, 
it  brushed  off.  At  first,  Augustin  must  have  felt 
himself  as  good  as  lost  there. 

There  he  was,  his  own  master,  with  nobody  to 
counsel  and  direct  him.  He  does  indeed  mention 
his  fellow-countryman,  that  Romanianus,  the  patron 
of  his  father  and  of  other  people  in  Thagaste,  as  a 
high  and  generous  friend  who  invited  him  to  his 
house  when  he,  a  poor  youth,  came  to  finish  his 
studies  in  a  strange  city,  and  helped  him,  not  only 
with  his  purse,  but  with  his  friendship.  Unfortu- 
nately the  allusion  is  not  very  clear.  Still,  it  docs 
seem  to  shew  that  Augustin,  in  the  first  days  after 
his  arrival  at  Carthage,  stayed  with  Romanianus. 
It  is  not  in  the  least  improbable  that  Romanianus 
had  a  house  at  Carthage  and  spent  the  winter  there  : 
during  the  rest  of  the  year  he  would  be  in  his  country 
houses  round  about  Thagaste.  This  opulent  bene- 
factor might  not  have  been  satisfied  with  giving 
Augustin  a  good  "  tip  "  for  his  journey  when  he  was 
leaving  his  native  town,  but  may  also  have  put  him 
up  in  his  own  house  at  Carthage.  Such  was  the 
atonement  for  those  enormous  fortunes  of  antiquity  : 
the  rich  had  to  give  freely  and  constantly.  With 
the  parcelling  out  of  wealth  we  have  become  much 
more  egoistical. 

In  any  case,  Romanianus,  taken  up  with  his 
pleasures  and  business,  could  not  have  been  much 
of  a  guide  for  Monnica's  son.     Augustin  was  there- 


CARTHAGO   VENERIS  75 

fore  without  control,  or  very  nearly.  No  doubt  he 
came  to  Carthage  with  a  strong  desire  to  increase 
his  knowledge  and  get  renown,  but  still  more  athirst 
for  love  and  the  emotions  of  sentiment.  The  love- 
prelude  was  deliciously  prolonged  for  him.  He  was 
at  that  time  so  overwhelmed  b}^  it,  that  it  is  the 
first  thing  he  thinks  of  when  he  relates  his  years  at 
Carthage.  "  To  love  and  be  loved  "  seems  to  him, 
as  to  his  dear  Alexandrine  poets,  the  single  object  of 
life.  Yet  he  was  not  in  love,  "  but  he  loved  the  idea 
of  love."  Nondum  amaham,  et  amare  amah  am  .  .  . 
amare  amans.  .  .  . 

Truly,  never  a  pagan  poet  had  hitherto  found 
such  language  to  speak  of  love.  These  subtle  phrases 
are  not  only  the  work  of  a  marvellous  word-smith  : 
through  their  almost  imperceptible  shades  of  mean- 
ing may  be  descried  an  entirely  new  soul,  the 
pleasure-loving  soul  of  the  old  world  awakening  to 
spiritual  life.  Modern  people  have  repeated  the 
words  more  than  enough,  but  by  translating  them 
too  literally — "  I  loved  to  love  " — they  have  perhaps 
distorted  the  sense.  They  have  made  Augustin  a 
kind  of  Romantic  like  Alfred  de  Musset,  a  dilettante 
in  love.  Augustin  is  not  so  modern,  although  he  often 
seems  one  of  ourselves.  When  he  wrote  those  words 
he  was  a  bishop  and  a  penitent.  What  strikes  him 
above  all  in  looking  back  upon  his  uneasy  and 
feverish  life  as  a  youth  and  young  man,  is  the  great 
onrush  of  all  his  being  which  swept  him  towards 
love.  Plainly,  man  is  made  for  love,  since  he  loves 
without  object  and  without  cause,  since  in  itself 
alone  the  idea  of  love  is  already  for  him  a  beginning 
of  love.  Only  he  falls  into  error  in  giving  to  creatures 
a  heart  that  the  Creator  alone  can  fill  and  satisfv. 


76  SAINT   AUGUSTIN 

In  this  love  for  love's  sake,  Augustin  discerned  the 
sign  of  the  predestined  soul  whose  tenderness  will 
find  no  rest  but  in  God.  That  is  why  he  repeats  this 
word  "  Love  "  with  a  kind  of  intoxication.  He 
knows  that  those  who  love  like  him  cannot  love  long 
with  a  human  love.  Nor  does  he  blush  to  acknow- 
ledge it : — he  loved — he  loved  with  all  his  soul — ^he 
loved  to  the  point  of  loving  the  coming  of  love. 
Happy  intimation  for  the  Christian  !  A  heart  so 
afire  is  pledged  to  the  eternal  marriage. 

With  this  heat  of  passion,  this  lively  sensibility, 
Augustin  was  a  prey  for  Carthage.  The  voluptuous 
city  took  complete  hold  on  him  by  its  charm  and  its 
beauty,  by  all  the  seductions  of  mind  and  sense,  by 
its  promises  of  easy  enjoyment. 

First  of  all,  it  softened  this  young  provincial,  used 
to  the  harder  country  life  of  his  home  ;  it  relaxed 
the  Numidian  contracted  by  the  roughness  of  his 
climate  ;  it  cooled  his  eyes  burned  by  the  sun  in  the 
full-flowing  of  its  waters  and  the  suavity  of  its 
horizons.  It  was  a  city  of  laziness,  and  above  all, 
of  pleasure,  as  well  for  those  plunged  in  business  as 
for  the  idlers.  They  called  it  Carthago  Veneris — 
Carthage  of  Venus.  And  certainly  the  old  Phoenician 
Tanit  always  reigned  there.  Since  the  rebuilding  of 
her  temple  by  the  Romans,  she  had  transformed 
herself  into  Virgo  Coelestis.  This  Virgin  of  Heaven 
was  the  great  Our  Lady  of  unchastity,  towards  whom 
still  mounted  the  adoration  of  the  African  land  four 
hundred  years  after  the  birth  of  Christ.  "  Strange 
Virgin,"  Augustin  was  to  say  later,  "  who  can  only 
be  honoured  by  the  loss  of  virginity."  Her  dissolving 
influence  seemed  to  overcome  the  whole  region. 
There  is  no  more  feminine  country  than  this  Cartha- 


CARTHAGO   VENERIS  ^^ 

ginian  peninsula,  ravished  on  all  sides  by  the  caress 
of  the  waters.  Stretched  out  between  her  lakes  on 
the  edge  of  the  sea,  Carthage  lounged  in  the  humid 
warmth  of  her  mists,  as  if  in  the  suffocating  atmo- 
sphere of  her  vapour-baths. 

She  stole  away  the  energies,  but  she  was  an  en-  • 
chantment  for  the  eyes.  From  the  top  of  the  im- 
pressive flight  of  steps  which  led  up  to  the  temple 
of  iEsculapius  on  the  summit  of  the  Acropolis, 
Augustin  could  see  at  his  feet  the  huge,  even-planned 
city,  with  its  citadel  walls  which  spread  out  indefin- 
itely, its  gardens,  blue  waters,  flaxen  plains,  and  the 
mountains.  Did  he  pause  on  the  steps  at  sunset, 
the  two  harbours,  rounded  cup-shape,  shone,  rimmed 
by  the  quays,  like  lenses  of  ruby.  To  the  left,  the 
Lake  of  Tunis,  stirless,  without  a  ripple,  as  rich  in 
ethereal  lights  as  a  Venetian  lagoon,  radiated  in  ever- 
altering  sheens,  delicate  and  splendid.  In  front, 
across  the  bay,  dotted  with  the  sails  of  ships  close- 
hauled  to  the  wind,  beyond  the  wind-swept  and 
shimmering  intervals,  the  mountains  of  Rhodes 
raised  their  aerial  summit-lines  against  the  sky. 
What  an  outlook  on  the  world  for  a  young  man 
dreaming  of  fame  !  And  what  more  exhilarating 
spot  than  this  Mount  Byrsa,  where,  in  deep  layers, 
so  many  heroic  memories  were  gathered  and  super- 
imposed. The  great  dusty  plains  which  bury  them- 
selves far  off  in  the  sands  of  the  desert,  the  mountains 
— yes,  and  isles  and  headlands,  all  bowed  before  the 
Hill  that  Virgil  sang  and  seemed  to  do  her  reverence. 
She  held  in  awe  the  innumerable  tribes  of  the  barbaric 
continent ;  she  was  mistress  of  the  sea.  Rome  herself,  cK<k'a^^  3 
from  the  height  of  her  Palatine,  surged  less  imperial,  j  1 

More  than  any  other  of  the  young  men  seated  with 


78  SAINT   AUGUSTIN 

him  on  the  benches  of  the  school  of  rhetoric, 
Augustin  hearkened  to  the  dumb  appeals  which 
came  from  the  ancient  ruins  and  new  palaces  of 
Carthage.  But  the  supple  and  treacherous  city 
laiew  the  secret  of  enchaining  the  will.  She  tempted 
him  by  the  open  display  of  her  amusements.  Under 
this  sun  which  touches  to  beauty  the  plaster  of  a  hut, 
the  grossest  pleasures  have  an  attraction  which  men 
of  the  North  cannot  understand.  The  overflowing 
of  lust  surrounds  you.  This  prolific  swarming,  all 
these  bodies,  close-pressed  and  soft  with  sweat, 
give  forth  as  it  were  a  breath  of  fornication  which 
melts  the  will.  Augustin  breathed  in  with  delight 
the  heavy  burning  air,  loaded  with  human  odours, 
which  filled  the  streets  and  squares  of  Carthage. 
To  all  the  bold  soliciting,  to  all  the  hands  stretched 
out  to  detain  him  as  he  walked,  he  yielded. 

But  for  a  mind  like  his  Carthage  had  more  subtle 
allurements  in  reserve.  He  was  taken  by  her 
theatres,  by  the  verses  of  her  poets  and  the  melodies 
of  her  musicians.  He  shed  tears  at  the  plays  of 
Menander  and  Terence  ;  he  lamented  upon  the 
misfortunes  of  separated  lovers  ;  he  shared  their 
quarrels,  rejoiced  and  despaired  with  them.  And 
still  he  awaited  the  epiphany  of  Love — that  Love 
which  the  performance  of  the  actors  shewed  him  to 
be  so  touching  and  fine. 

Such  then  was  Augustin,  given  over  to  the 
irresponsibility  of  his  eighteen  years — a  heart  spoiled 
by  romantic  literature,  a  mind  impatient  to  try 
every  sort  of  intellectual  adventure  in  the  most 
corrupting  and  bewitching  city  known  to  the  pagan 
centuries,  set  amidst  one  of  the  most  entrancing 
landscapes  in  the  world. 


II 

•   THE   AFRICAN    ROME 

CARTHAGE  did  not  offer  only  pleasures  to 
Augustin  ;  it  was  besides  an  extraordinary 
subject  to  think  about  for  an  understanding  so  alert 
and  all-embracing  as  his. 

At  Carthage  he  understood  the  Roman  grandeur 
as  he  could  not  at  Madaura  and  the  Numidian 
towns.  Here,  as  elsewhere,  the  Romans  made  a 
point  of  impressing  the  minds  of  conquered  races  by 
the  display  of  their  strength  and  magnificence. 
Above  all,  they  aimed  at  the  immense.  The  towns 
built  by  them  offered  the  same  decorative  and 
monumental  character  of  the  Greek  cities  of  the 
Hellenistic  period,  which  the  Romans  had  further 
exaggerated — a  character  not  without  emphasis 
and  over-elaboration,  but  which  was  bound  to 
astonish,  and  that  was  the  main  thing  in  their 
view.  In  short,  their  ideal  was  not  perceptibly 
different  from  that  of  our  modern  town  councillors. 
To  lay  out  streets  which  intersected  at  right  angles  ; 
to  create  towns  cut  into  even  blocks  like  chess- 
boards ;  to  multiply  prospects  and  huge  architec- 
tural masses — all  the  Roman  cities  of  this  period 
revealed  such  an  aim,  with  an  almost  identical  plan. 

Erected  after  this  type,  the  new  Carthage  caused 
the  old  to  be  forgotten.  Everybody  agreed  that  it 
was  second  only  to   Rome.     The   African  writers 

79 


8o  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

squandered  the  most  hyperbolical  praises  upon  it. 
For   them   it   is   "  The   splendid,   the   august,   the 
sublime  Carthage."     Although  there  may  well  be  a 
certain    amount    of   triviality    or    of   patriotic    ex- 
aggeration in  these  praises,  it  is  certain  that  the 
Roman  capital  of  the  Province  of  Africa  was  no 
less   considerable   than  the   old  metropolis   of  the 
I  Hanno  and  Barcine  factions.     With  a  population 
I  almost  as  large  as  that  of  Rome,  it  had  almost  as  great 
a  circumference.     It  must  further  be  recalled  that 
as  it  had  no  ramparts  till  the  Vandal  invasion,  the 
city  overflowed  into  the  country.    With  its  gardens, 
villas,   and   burial-places   of   the   dead,   it   covered 
nearly  the  entire  peninsula,  to-day  depopulated. 
.       Carthage,  as  well  as  Rome,  had  her  Capitol  and 
f   Palatine  upon  Mount  Bj^rsa,  where  rose  no  doubt 
a    temple    consecrated    to    the    Capitolean    triune 
deities,  Jupiter,  Juno,  and  Minerva,  not  far  from 
the  great  temple   of  ^Esculapius,  a  modern  trans- 
formation of  the  old  Punic  Eschmoum.     Hard  by 
these  sanctuaries,  the  Proconsul's  palace  dominated 
Carthage  from  the  height  of  the  acclivity  of  the 
Acropolis.     The  Forum  was  at  the  foot  of  the  hill, 
probably    in    the    neighbourhood    of    the    ports — a 
'  Forum  built  and  arranged  in  the  Roman  way,  with 
its  shops   of  bankers   and  money-changers  placed 
;  under   the   circular   galleries,    with   the   traditional 
/  image  of  Marsyas,  and  a  number  of  statues  of  local 
celebrities.      Apulcius    no    doubt    had    his    there. 
Further  off  was  the  Harbour  Square,  where  gathered 
i   foreigners  recently  landed  and  the  idlers  of  the  city 
in  search  of  news,  and  where  the  booksellers  offered 
the  new  books  and  pamphlets.     There  was  to  be 
seen  one  of  the  curiosities  of  Carthage — a  mosaic 


THE   AFRICAN   ROME  8i 

representing  fabulous  monsters,  men  without  heads, 
and  men  with  only  one  leg  and  one  foot — a  huge 
foot  under  which,  lying  upon  their  backs,  they 
sheltered  from  the  sun,  as  under  a  parasol.  On 
account  of  this  feature  they  were  called  the  sciapodes. 
Augustin,  who  like  everybody  else  had  paused 
before  these  grotesque  figures,  recalls  them  some- 
where to  his  readers.  .  .  .  Beside  the  sea,  in  the 
lower  town  and  upon  the  two  near  hills  of  the 
Acropolis,  were  a  number  of  detached  buildings 
that  the  old  authors  have  preserved  the  names  of  and 
briefly  described.  Thanks  to  the  zeal  of  archaeologists, 
it  is  now  become  impossible  to  tell  where  they  stood. 
The  pagan  sanctuaries  were  numerous.  That  of 
the  goddess  Coelestis,  the  great  patroness  of  Carthage,  i 
occupied  a  space  of  five  thousand  feet.  It  com- 
prised, besides  the  actual  lepov,  where  stood  the 
image  of  the  goddess,  gardens,  sacred  groves,  and  ; 
courts  surrounded  with  columns.  The  ancient  \ 
Phoenician  Moloch  had  also  his  temple  under  the  ' 
name  of  Saturn.  They  called  him  The  Old  One,  so 
Augustin  tells  us,  and  his  worshippers  were  falling 
away.  On  the  other  hand,  Carthage  had  another 
sanctuary  which  was  very  fashionable,  a  Serapeiim 
as  at  Alexandria,  where  were  manifested  the  pomps 
of  the  Egyptian  ritual,  celebrated  by  Apuleius. 
Neighbouring  the  holy  places,  came  the  places  of 
amusement  :  the  theatre,  the  Odeum,  circus, 
stadium,  and  amphitheatre — this  last,  of  equal 
dimensions  with  the  Colosseum  at  Rome,  its  gallery 
rising  upon  galler}/,  and  its  realistic  sculptures  of 
animals  and  artisans.  Then  there  were  the  buildings 
for  the  public  service :  the  immense  cisterns  of  the 
East  and  the  Malga,   the    great  aqueduct,   which. 


82  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

after  being  carried  along  a  distance  of  fifty-five 
miles,  emptied  the  water  of  the  Zaghouan  into  the 
reservoirs  at  Carthage.  Finally,  there  were  the 
Baths,  some  of  which  we  know — those  of  An- 
toninus and  of  Maximianus,  and  those  of  Gargilius, 
where  one  of  the  most  important  Councils  known 
to  the  history  of  the  African  Church  assembled. 
There  were  likewise  many  Christian  basilicas  at 
the  time  of  Augustin.  The  authors  mention  seven- 
teen :  it  is  likely  there  were  more.  That  of  Damous- 
el-Karita,  the  only  one  of  which  considerable  traces 
have  been  found,  was  vast  and  richly  decorated,  and 
was  perhaps  the  cathedral  of  Carthage. 

^  What  other  buildings  there  were  are  utterly  lost 
to  history.  It  may  be  conjectured,  however,  that 
Carthage,  as  well  as  Rome,  had  a  septizonium — a 
decorative  building  with  peristyles  one  above  the 
other  which  surrounded  a  reservoir.  In  fact,  it  is 
claimed  that  the  one  at  Rome  was  copied  from 
Carthage.  Straight  streets  paved  with  large  flags 
intersected  around  these  buildings,  forming  a  net- 
work of  long  avenues,  very  bright  and  ventilated. 
Some  of  them  were  celebrated  in  the  ancient  world 
either  for  their  beauty  or  the  animation  of  their  trade: 
the  street  of  the  Jewellers,  the  street  of  Health,  of 
Saturn,  of  Coelestis,  too,  or  of  Juno.  The  fig  and 
vegetable  markets  and  the  public  granaries  were 
also  some  of  the  main  centres  of  Carthaginian  life. 

It  is  xmquestionable  that  Carthage,  with  its  buildings 
and  statues,  its  squares,  avenues  and  public  gardens, 
looked  like  a  large  capita],  and  was  a  perfect  example 
of   that   ideal   of    rather  brutal    magnificence  and 

(^strength  which  the  Romans  obtruded  everywhere. 
And  even  while  it  dazzled  the  young  provincial 


THE   AFRICAN    ROME  83 

from  Thagaste,  the  African  Rome  shewed  him  the 
virtue  of  order — social  and  poUtical  order.  Carthage, 
the  metropohs  of  Western  Africa,  maintained  an 
army  of  officials  who  handled  the  government  in 
its  smallest  details.  First  of  all,  there  were  the 
representatives  of  the  central  power,  the  imperial 
rulers — the  Proconsul,  a  sort  of  vice-emperor,  who 
was  surrounded  by  a  full  court,  a  civil  and  military 
staff,  a  privy  council,  an  officium  which  included  a 
crowd  of  dignitaries  and  subaltern  clerks.  Then 
there  was  the  Propraetor  of  Africa  who,  being  in 
control  of  the  government  of  the  whole  African 
province,  had  an  officium  still  larger  perhaps  than 
the  Proconsul's.  After  them  came  the  city 
magistrates,  who  were  aided  in  their  functions  by 
the  Council  of  the  Decurions — the  Senate  of 
Carthage.  These  Carthaginian  senators  cut  a  con- 
siderable figure  :  for  them  their  colleagues  at  Rome 
were  full  of  airs  and  graces,  and  the  Emperors 
endeavoured  to  keep  them  in  a  good-humour.  All 
the  details  of  city  government  came  under  their 
supervision :  the  slaughter-houses,  buildings,  the 
gathering  of  municipal  taxes,  and  the  police,  which 
comprised  even  the  guardians  of  the  Forum.  Then 
there  were  the  army  and  navy.  The  home  port  of  a 
grain-carrying  fleet  which  conveyed  the  African 
cereals  to  Ostia,  Carthage  could  starve  Rome  if  she 
liked.  The  grain  and  oil  of  all  countries  lay  in  her 
docks — the  storehouses  of  the  state  provisions,  which 
were  in  charge  of  a  special  prefect  who  had  under 
his  orders  a  whole  corporation  of  overseers  and  clerks. 
Augustin  must  have  heard  a  good  deal  of  grum- 
bling at  Carthage  against  this  excess  of  officialism. 
But,  all  the  same,  so  well-governed  a  city  was  a 


84  SAINT   AUGUSTIN 

very  good  school  for  a  young  man  who  was  to 
combine  later  the  duties  of  bishop,  judge,  and 
governor.  The  blessings  of  order,  of  what  was 
called  "  the  Roman  peace,"  no  doubt  impressed 
him  the  more,  as  he  himself  came  from  a  turbulent 
district  often  turned  upside  dov/n  by  the  quarrels  of 
religious  sects  and  by  the  depredations  of  the 
nomads — a  boundary-land  of  the  Sahara  regions 
where  it  was  much  harder  to  bring  the  central 
government  into  play  than  in  Carthage  and  the 
coast-towns.  To  appreciate  the  beauty  of  govern- 
ment, there  is  nothing  like  living  in  a  countr^^  where 
all  is  at  the  mercy  of  force  or  the  first-comer's  will. 
Such  of  the  Barbarians  who  came  in  contact  with 
Roman  civilization  were  overcome  with  admiration 
for  the  good  order  that  it  established.  But  what 
astonished  them  more  than  anything  else  was  that 
the  Empire  w^as  everywhere. 

No  man,  whatever  his  race  or  country,  could  help 
feeling  proud  to  belong  to  the  Roman  city.  He 
was  at  home  in  all  the  countries  in  the  world  subject 
to  Rome.  Our  Europe,  split  into  nationalities,  can 
hardly  understand  now  this  feeling  of  pride,  so 
different  from  our  narrow  patriotisms.  The  way  to 
feel  something  of  it  is  to  go  to  the  colonies  :  out 
there  the  least  of  us  may  believe  himself  a  sovereign, 
simply  from  the  fact  that  he  is  a  subject  of  the 
governing  country.  This  feeling  was  ver}^  strong  in 
the  old  world.  Carthage,  where  the  striking  effect 
of  the  Empire  appeared  in  all  its  brilliancy,  would 
increase  it  in  Augustin.  He  had  only  to  look  around 
him  to  value  the  extent  of  the  privilege  conferred 
by  Rome  on  her  citizens.  Men  coming  from  all 
countries,   without  exception  of  race,   were,  so  to 


THE   AFRICAN   ROME  85 

speak,  made  partners  of  the  Empire  and  collaborated 
in  the  grandeur  of  the  Roman  scheme.  If  the  Pro- 
consul who  then  occupied  the  Byrsa  palace,  the 
celebrated  Symmachus,  belonged  to  an  old  Italian 
family,  he  whom  he  represented,  the  Emperor 
Valentinian,  was  the  son  of  a  Pannonian  soldier. 
The  Count  Theodosius,  the  general  who  suppressed 
the  insurrection  of  Firmus  in  Mauretania,  was  a 
Spaniard,  and  the  army  he  led  into  Africa  was  made 
up,  for  the  most  part,  of  Gauls.  Later  on,  under 
Arcadius,  another  Gaul,  Rufinus,  shall  be  master 
of  the  whole  of  the  East. 

An  active  mind  like  Augustin's  could  not  remain 
indifferent  before  this  spectacle  of  the  world  thrown 
open  by  Rome  to  all  men  of  talent.  He  had  the 
soul  of  a  poet,  quick  to  enthusiasm  :  the  sight  of  the 
Eagles  planted  on  the  Acropolis  at  Carthage  moved 
him  in  a  way  he  never  forgot.  He  acquired  the 
habit  of  seeing  big,  and  began  to  cast  off  race  preju- 
dices and  all  the  petty  narrowness  of  a  local 
spirit.  When  he  became  a  Christian  he  did  not 
close  himself  up,  like  the  Donatists,  within  the 
African  Church.  His  dream  was  that  Christ's  Empire 
upon  earth  should  equal  the  Empire  of  the  Caesars. 

Still,  it  is  desirable  not  to  fall  into  error  upon  this 
Roman  unity.  Behind  the  imposing  front  it  shewed 
from  one  end  to  the  other  of  the  Mediterranean,  the 
variety  of  peoples,  with  their  manners,  traditions, 
special  religions,  was  always  there,  and  in  Africa 
more  than  elsewhere.  The  population  of  Carthage  j 
was  astonishingly  mixed.  The  hybrid  character  of  ■ 
this  country  without  unity  was  illustrated  by  the 
streaks  found  in  the  Carthaginian  crowds.  All  the 
specimens  of  African  races  elbowed  one  another  ins 


86  SAINT   AUGUSTIN 

the  streets,  from  the  nigger,  brought  from  his  native 
Soudan  by  the  slave-merchant,  to  the  Romanized 
Numidian.  The  inflow,  continually  renewed,  of 
traffickers  and  cosmopolitan  adventurers  increased 
this  confusion.     And  so  Carthage  was  a  Babel  of 

'  races,  of  costumes,  of  beliefs  and  ideas.  Augustin, 
who  was  at  heart  a  mystic,  but  also  a  dialectician 
extremelj/  fond  of  showy  discussions,  found  in 
Carthage  a  lively  summary  of  the  religions  and 
philosophies  of  his  day.  During  these  years  of  study 
and  reflection  he  captured  booty  of  knowledge  and 
observation  which  he  would  know  how  to  make  use 
of  in  the  future. 

In  the  Carthage  sanctuaries  and  schools,  in  the 
squares  and  the  streets,  he  could  see  pass  the 
disciples  of  all  the  systems,  the  props  of  all  the 
superstitions,  the  devotees  of  all  the  religions.  He 
heard  the  shrill  clamour  of  disputes,  the  tumult  of 
fights  and  riots.  When  a  man  was  at  the  end  of  his 
arguments,  he  knocked  down  his  opponent.  The 
authorities  had  a  good  deal  of  trouble  to  keep  order. 
Augustin,  who  was  an  intrepid  logician,  must  have 
longed  to  take  his  share  in  these  rows.  But  one 
cannot  exactly  improvise  a  faith  between  to-day 
and  to-morrow.  While  he  awaited  the  enlightenment 
of  the  truth,  he  studied  the  Carthaginian  Babel. 
First  of  all,  there  was  the  official  religion,  the  most 

1  obvious  and  perhaps  the  most  brilliant,  that  of  the 
Divinity  of  the  Emperors,  which  was  still  kept  up 

i  even  under  the  Christian  Caesars.     Each  year,  at 

*  the  end  of  October,  the  elected  delegates  of  the 
entire  province,  having  at  their  head  the  Sacerdos 
pYovincice,  the  provincial  priest,  arrived  at  Carthage. 
Their  leader,  clad  in  a  robe  broidered  with   palms. 


THE   AFRICAN   ROME  87 

gold  crown  on  head,  made  his  solemn  entry  into 
the  city.  It  was  a  perfect  invasion,  each  member 
dragging  in  his  wake  a  mob  of  clients  and  servants. 
The  Africans,  with  their  taste  for  pomp  and  colour, 
seized  the  chance  to  give  themselves  over  to  a  dis- 
play of  ruinous  sumptuosities  :  rich  dresses,  ex- 
pensive horses  splendidly  caparisoned,  processions, 
sacrifices,  public  banquets,  games  at  the  circus  and 
amphitheatre.  These  strangers  so  overcrowded  the 
city  that  the  imperial  Government  had  to  forbid 
them,  under  severe  penalties,  to  stay  longer  than 
five  days.  A  very  prudent  measure  !  At  these 
times,  collisions  were  inevitable  between  pagans 
and  Christians.  It  was  desirable  to  scatter  such 
crowds  as  soon  as  possible,  for  riots  were  always 
smouldering  in  their  midst. 

No  less  thronged  were  the  festivals  of  the  Virgin 
of  Heaven.  A  survival  of  the  national  religion, 
these  feasts  were  dear  to  the  hearts  of  the  Cartha- 
ginians. Augustin  went  to  them  with  his  fellow- 
students.  "  We  trooped  there  from  every  quarter," 
he  says.  There  was  a  great  gathering  of  people  in 
the  interior  court  which  led  up  to  the  temple.  The 
statue,  taken  from  its  sanctuary,  was  placed  before 
the  peristyle  upon  a  kind  of  repository.  Wantons, 
arrayed  with  barbarous  lavishness,  danced  around 
the  holy  image  ;  actors  performed  and  sang  hymns. 
''  Our  eager  eyes,"  Augustin  adds  mahciously, 
**  rested  in  turn  on  the  goddess,  and  on  the  girls, 
her  adorers."  The  Great  Mother  of  the  Gods,  the 
Goddess  of  Mount  Berecyntus,  was  worshipped  with 
similar  license.  Every  year  the  people  of  Carthage 
went  to  wash  her  solemnly  in  the  sea.  Her  statue, 
carried  in   a  splendid  litter,   robed   with   precious 


88  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

stuffs,  curled  and  farded,  passed  through  the 
streets  of  the  city,  with  its  guard  of  mummers 
and  Corybants.  These  last,  "  with  hair  greasy  from 
pomade,  pale  faces,  and  a  loose  and  effeminate 
walk,  held  out  bowls  for  alms  to  the  onlookers." 

The  devotion  to  Isis  was  yet  another  excuse  for 
processions  :  the  Serapcum  was  a  rival  attraction 
to  the  temple  of  the  Heavenly  Maiden.  If  we  may 
trust  Tertullian,  the  Africans  swore  only  by  Serapis. 
Possibly  Mithras  had  also  worshippers  in  Carthage. 
Anyhow,  the  occult  religions  were  fully  represented 
there.  Miracle-working  was  becoming  more  and 
more  the  basis  even  of  paganism.  Never  had  the 
soothsayers  been  more  flourishing.  Everybody,  in 
secret,  pried  into  the  entrails  of  the  sacrificial 
victims,  or  used  magic  spells.  As  to  the  wizards 
and  astrologists,  they  did  business  openly.  Augustin 
himself  consulted  them,  like  all  the  Carthaginians. 
The  public  credulity  had  no  limits. 

On  the  opposite  side  from  the  pagan  worship, 
the  sects  which  had  sprung  from  Christianity 
sprouted.  True,  Africa  has  given  birth  to  but  a 
small  number  of  heresies  :  the  Africans  had  not  the 
subtle  mind  of  the  Orientals  and  they  were  not 
given  to  theorizing.  But  a  good  many  of  the 
Eastern  heresies  had  got  into  Carthage.  Augustin 
must  have  still  met  Arians  there,  although  at  this 
period  Arianism  was  dying  out  in  Africa.  What 
is  certain  is  that  orthodox  Catholicism  was  in  a 
very  critical  state.  The  Donatists  captured  it^  con- 
gregations and  churches  ;  they  were  unquestion- 
ably in  the  majority.  They  raised  altar  against 
altar.  If  Genethlius  was  the  Catholic  bishop,  the 
Donatist    bishop    was    Parmenianus.      And    they 


THE   AFRICAN   ROME  89 

claimed  to  be  more  Catholic  than  their  opponents. 
They  boasted  that  they  were  the  Church,  the  single, 
the  unique  Church,  the  Church  of  Christ.  But 
these  schismatics  themselves  were  already  splitting 
up  into  many  sects.  At  the  time  Augustin  was 
studying  at  Carthage,  Rogatus,  Bishop  of  Tenes, 
had  just  broken  publicly  with  Parmenian's  party. 
Another  Donatist,  Tyconius,  published  books  where- 
in he  traversed  many  principles  dear  to  his  fellow- 
religionists.  Doubt  darkened  consciences.  Amid 
these  controversies,  where  was  the  truth  ?  Among 
whom  did  the  Apostolic  tradition  dwell  ? 

To  put  the  finishing  touch  on  this  anarchy,  a 
sect  which  likewise  derived  from  Christianity — 
Manicheeism — began  to  have  numerous  adepts  in 
Africa.  Watched  with  suspicion  by  the  Govern- 
ment, it  concealed  part  of  its  doctrine,  the  most 
scandalous  and  subversive.  But  the  very  mystery 
which  enveloped  it,  helped  it  to  get  adherents. 

Among  all  these  apostles  preaching  their  gospel, 
these  devotees  beating  the  drum  before  their  god, 
these  theologians  reciprocally  insulting  and  ex- 
communicating one  another,  Augustin  brought  the 
superficial  scepticism  of  his  eighteenth  year.  He 
wanted  no  more  of  the  religion  in  which  his  mother 
had  brought  him  up.  He  was  a  good  talker,  a  clever 
dialectician  ;  he  was  in  a  hurry  to  emancipate  him- 
self, to  win  freedom  for  his  way  of  thinking  as  for  his 
way  of  life  ;  and  he  meant  to.  enjoy  his  youth.  With 
such  gifts,  and  with  such  dispositions,  he  could  only 
choose  among  all  these  doctrines  that  which  would 
help  most  the  qualities  of  his  mind,  at  once  flatter- 
ing his  intellectual  pretensions,  and  leaving  his 
pleasure-loving  instincts  a  loose  rein. 


Ill 

THE    CARTHAGE    STUDENT 

HOWEVER  strong  were  the  attractions  of  the 
great  cit}^  Augustin  well  knew  that  he  had 
not  been  sent  there  to  amuse  himself,  or  to  trifle 
as  an  amateur  with  philosophy.  He  was  poor, 
and  he  had  to  secure  his  future — make  his  fortune. 
His  family  counted  on  him.  Neither  was  he  ignorant 
of  the  difficult  position  of  his  parents  and  by  what 
sacrifices  they  had  supplied  him  with  the  means  to 
finish  his  studies.  Necessarily  he  was  obliged  to 
be  a  student  who  worked. 

With  his  extraordinary  facility,  he  stood  out  at 
once  among  his  fellow-students.  In  the  rhetoric 
school,  where  he  attended  lectures,  he  was,  he  tells 
us,  not  only  at  the  top,  but  he  was  the  leader  of  his 
companions.  He  led  in  everything.  At  that  time, 
rhetoric  was  extremely  far-reaching  :  it  had  come 
to  take  in  all  the  divisions  of  education,  including 
science  and  philosophy.  Augustin  claims  to  have 
learned  all  that  the  masters  of  his  time  had  to 
teach  :  rhetoric,  dialectic,  geometry,  music,  mathe- 
matics. Having  gone  through  the  whole  scholastic 
system,  he  thought  of  studying  law,  and  aided  by 
his  gift  of  words,  to  become  a  barrister.  For  a 
gifted  young  man  it  was  the  shortest  and  surest  road 
to  money  and  honours. 

Unhappily  for  him,  hardly  was  he  settled  down 

90 


THE   CARTHAGE   STUDENT  91 

at  Carthage  than  his  father  died.  This  made  his 
future  again  problematical.  How  was  he  to  keep  up 
his  studies  without  the  sums  coming  from  his 
father  ?  The  affairs  of  Patricius  must  have  been  left 
in  the  most  parlous  condition.  But  Monnica,  cling- 
ing to  her  ambitious  plans  for  her  son,  knew  how  to 
triumph  over  all  difficulties,  and  she  continued  to 
send  Augustin  money.  Romanianus,  the  Maecenas 
of  Thagaste,  who  was  doubtless  applied  to  by  her, 
came  once  more  to  the  rescue  of  the  hard-up  student. 
The  young  man,  set  at  ease  about  his  expenses, 
resumed  light-heartedly  his  studious  and  dissipated 
Hfe. 

As  a  matter  of  fact,  this  family  bereavement  does 
not  seem  to  have  caused  him  much  grief.  In 
the  Confessions  he  mentions  the  death  of  his  father 
in  a  few  words,  and,  so  to  speak,  in  parenthesis,  as 
an  event  long  foreseen  without  much  importance. 
And  yet  he  owed  him  a  great  deal.  Patricius  was 
hard  pressed,  and  he  took  immense  trouble  to  pro- 
vide the  means  for  his  son's  education.  But  with 
the  fine  egotism  of  youth,  Augustin  perhaps  thought 
it  enough  to  have  profited  by  his  father's  sacrifices, 
and  dispensed  himself  from  gratitude.  In  any 
case,  his  affection  for  his  father  must  have  been 
rather  lukewarm  ;  the  natural  differences  between 
them  ran  too  deep.  In  these  years,  Monnica  filled 
all  the  heart  of  Augustin. 

But  the  influence  of  Monnica  herself  was  very 
slight  upon  this  grown-up  youth,  eighteen  years  old. 
He  had  forgotten  her  lessons,  and  it  did  not 
trouble  him  much  if  his  conduct  added  to  the 
worries  of  the  widow,  who  was  now  struggling  with 
her  husband's  creditors.     At  heart  he  was  a  good 


92  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

son  and  he  deeply  loved  his  mother,  but  inevitably 
the  pressure  of  the  life  around  him  swept  him  along. 

He  has  pictured  his  companions  for  us,  after  his 
conversion,  as  terrible  blackguards.  No  doubt  he 
is  too  severe.  Those  young  men  were  neither  better 
nor  worse  than  elsewhere.  They  were  rowdy,  as 
they  were  in  the  other  cities  of  the  Empire,  and  as 
one  always  is  at  that  age.  Imperial  regulations  en- 
joined the  police  to  have  an  eye  on  the  students, 
to  note  their  conduct  and  what  company  they  kept. 
They  were  not  to  become  members  of  prohibited 
societies,  not  to  go  too  often  to  the  theatre,  nor  to 
waste  their  time  in  raking  and  f eastings.  If  their 
conduct  became  too  outrageous,  they  were  to  be 
beaten  with  rods  and  sent  back  to  their  parents. 
At  Carthage  there  was  a  hard-living  set  of  men  who 
called  themselves  "  The  Wreckers."  Their  great 
pleasure  was  to  go  and  make  a  row  at  a  professor's 
lecture  ;  they  would  burst  noisily  into  the  class- 
room and  smash  up  anything  they  could  lay  hold 
of.  They  amused  themselves  also  by  "ragging"  the 
freshmen,  jeering  at  their  simplicity,  and  playing  them 
a  thousand  tricks.  Things  haven't  much  changed 
since  then.  The  fellow-students  of  Augustin  were  so 
like  students  of  to-day  that  the  most  modern  terms 
suggest  themselves  to  describe  their  performances. 

Augustin,  who  was  on  the  whole  well  conducted, 
and,  as  behoved  a  future  professor,  had  a  respect 
for  discipline,  disapproved  of  "  The  Wreckers " 
and  their  violence.  This  did  not  prevent  him  from 
enjoying  himself  in  their  society.  He  was  over- 
come with  shame  because  he  could  not  keep  pace 
with  them — we  must  believe  it  at  least,  since  he 
tells  us  so  himself.     With  a  certain  lack  of  assurance. 


THE   CARTHAGE   STUDENT  93 

blended  however  with  much  juvenile  vanity,  he 
joined  the  band.  He  listened  to  that  counsel  of 
vulgar  wisdom  which  is  disastrous  to  souls  like  his : 
"Do  as  others  do."  He  accordingly  did  do  as  the 
others  ;  he  knew  all  their  debauchery,  or  he  imagined 
he  did,  for  however  low  he  went,  he  was  never  able 
to  do  anything  mean.  He  was  then  so  far  from  the 
faith  that  he  arranged  love-trysts  in  the  churches. 
"  I  was  not  afraid  to  think  of  my  lust,  and  plan  a 
scheme  for  securing  the  deadly  fruit  of  sin,  even 
within  the  walls  of  Thy  church  during  the  cele- 
bration of  Thy  mysteries."  We  might  be  reading 
the  confession  of  a  sensualist  of  to-day.  One  grows 
astonished  at  these  morals,  at  once  so  old  and  so 
modern.  What,  already  !  These  young  Christian 
basilicas,  but  newly  sprung  out  of  the  earth,  where 
the  men  were  strictly  separated  from  the  women — 
were  they  already  become  places  of  assignation, 
where  love-letters  were  slipped  into  hands,  and 
procuresses  sold  their  furtive  services  !  .  .  . 

At  length  the  great  happiness  for  which  Augustin 
had  so  long  been  sighing  was  granted  him  :  he  loved 
and  he  was  loved. 

He  loved  as  he  indeed  was  able  to  love,  with  all 
the  impetuosity  of  his  nature  and  all  the  fire  of  his 
temperament,  with  all  his  heart  and  all  his  senses. 
"  I  plunged  headlong  into  love,  whose  fetters  I 
longed  to  wear."  But  as  he  went  at  once  to  ex- 
tremes, as  he  meant  to  give  himself  altogether,  and 
expected  all  in  return,  he  grew  irritated  at  not 
receiving  this  same  kind  of  love.  It  was  never 
enough  love  for  him.  Yet  he  was  loved,  and  the 
very  certainty  of  this  love,  always  too  poor  to  his 
mind,  exasperated  the  violence  and  pertinacity  of 


94  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

his  desire.  "  Because  I  was  loved,  I  proudly  riveted 
round  myself  the  chain  of  woe,  to  be  soon  scourged 
with  the  red-hot  iron  rods  of  jealousy,  torn  by 
suspicions,  fears,  anger,  and  quarrels."  This  was 
passion  with  chorus  and  orchestra,  a  little  theatrical, 
with  its  violences,  its  alternations  between  fury  and 
ecstasy,  such  as  an  African,  steeped  in  romantic 
literature,  would  conceive  it.  Deceived,  he  flung 
himself  in  desperate  pursuit  of  the  ever-flitting  love. 
He  had  certainly  more  than  one  passion.  Each  one 
left  him  more  hungry  than  the  last. 

He  was  sensual,  and  he  felt  each  time  how  brief 
is  pleasure,  in  what  a  limited  circle  all  enjoyment 
turns.  He  was  tender,  eager  to  give  himself  ;  and 
he  saw  plainly  that  one  never  gives  oneself  quite 
altogether,  that  even  in  the  maddest  hours  of  sur- 
render one  always  reserves  oneself  in  secret,  keeping 
for  oneself  something  of  oneself  ;  and  he  felt  that 
most  of  the  time  his  tenderness  got  no  answer. 
When  the  joyous  heart  brings  the  offering  of  its 
love,  the  heart  of  her  he  loves  is  absent.  And  when 
it  is  there,  on  the  edge  of  the  lips,  decked  and  smiling 
to  meet  the  loved  one,  it  is  the  other  who  is  absent. 
Almost  never  do  they  join  together,  and  they  never 
join  together  altogether.  And  so  this  Love,  which 
claims  to  be  constant  and  even  eternal,  ought  to  be, 
if  it  would  prolong  itself,  a  continual  act  of  faith, 
and  hope,  and  charity.  To  believe  in  it  in  spite 
of  its  darkening  and  falling  away  ;  to  hope  its 
return,  often  against  all  evidence  ;  to  pardon  its 
injustices  and  sometimes  its  foul  actions — how  many 
are  capable  of  such  abnegation  ?  Augustin  went 
through  all  that.  He  was  in  despair  about  it.  And 
then,  the  nostalgia  of  predestined  souls  took  hold  of 


THE   CARTHAGE   STUDENT  95 

him.  He  had  an  indistinct  feehng  that  these  human 
loves  were  unworthy  of  him,  and  that  if  he  must 
have  a  master,  he  was  born  to  serve  another  Master. 
He  had  a  desire  to  shake  off  the  platitude  of  here 
below,  the  melancholy  fen  where  stagnated  what  he 
calls  "  the  marsh  of  the  flesh  "  ;  to  escape,  in  a  word, 
from  the  wretched  huts  wherein  for  a  little  he  had 
sheltered  his  heart ;  to  burn  all  behind  him,  and  so 
prevent  the  weakness  of  a  return;  and  to  go  and 
pitch  his  tent  further,  higher,  he  knew  not  where — 
upon  some  unapproachable  mountain  where  the 
air  is  icy,  but  before  the  eyes,  the  vasty  stretches  of 
light  and  space.  .  .  . 

These  first  loves  of  Augustin  were  really  too  fierce 
to  last.  They  burned  up  themselves.  Augustin  did 
not  keep  them  up  long.  There  was  in  him,  besides, 
an  instinct  which  counteracted  his  exuberant, 
amorous  sentimentality — the  sense  of  beauty.  That 
in  itself  was  enough  to  make  him  pause  on  the  down- 
hill of  riot.  The  anarchy  and  commotion  of  passion 
was  repellent  to  a  mind  devoted  to  clearness  and 
order.  But  there  was  still  another  thing — the  son 
of  the  Thagaste  freeholder  had  any  amount  of  com- 
mon sense.  That  at  least  was  left  to  him  of  the 
paternal  heritage.  A  youth  of  what  we  call  the  lower 
middle  class,  strictly  brought  up  in  the  hard  and 
frugal  discipline  of  the  provinces,  he  felt  the  effects 
of  his  training.  The  bohemianism  in  which  his 
friends  revelled  could  not  hold  him  indefinitely. 
Besides  this,  the  career  he  desired,  that  of  a  barrister 
or  professor,  had  a  preliminary  obligation  to  main- 
tain a  certain  outward  decorum.  He  himself  tells 
us  so  ;  in  the  midst  of  his  most  disreputable  per- 
formances he  aspired  to  be  known  for  his  fashion 


96  SAINT   AUGUSTIN 

and  wit — elegans  atque  urbanus.  Politeness  of  speech 
and  manners,  the  courteous  mutual  deference  of 
the  best  society — such  was  the  ideal  of  this  budding 
professor  of  rhetoric. 

Anxiety  about  his  future,  joined  to  his  rapid  dis- 
enchantments,  ere  long  sobered  the  student  :  he 
just  took  his  fling  and  then  settled  down.  Love 
turned  for  him  into  sensual  habit.  His  head  became 
clear  for  study  and  meditation.  The  apprentice  to 
rhetoric  liked  his  business.  Up  to  his  last  breath, 
despite  his  efforts  to  change,  he  continued,  like  all 
his  contemporaries,  to  love  rhetoric.  He  handled 
words  like  a  worker  in  verbals  who  is  aware  of  their 
price  and  knows  all  their  resources.  Even  after  his 
conversion,  if  he  condemns  profane  literature  as  a 
poisoner  of  souls,  he  absolves  the  beauty  of  language. 
"  I  accuse  not  words,"  he  says.  "  Words  are  choice 
and  precious  vessels.  I  accuse  the  wine  of  error 
that  drunken  doctors  pour  out  for  us  into  these 
fair  goblets."  At  the  Rhetoric  School  he  took 
extreme  pleasure  in  declaiming.  He  was  applauded  ; 
the  professor  gave  him  as  an  example  to  the  others. 
These  scholastic  triumphs  foretold  others  more 
celebrated  and  reverberating.  And  so,  in  his  heart, 
literary  vanity  and  ambition  disputed  the  ever- 
lively  illusions  of  love.  And  then,  above  all !  he 
had  to  live  ;  Monnica's  remittances  were  necessarily 
small ;  the  generosity  of  Romanianus  had  its  limit. 
So  he  beat  about  to  enlarge  his  small  student's 
purse.  He  wrote  verses  for  poetic  competitions. 
Perhaps  already  he  was  able  to  act  as  tutor  to 
certain  of  his  fellow-students,  less  advanced. 

H  the  need  of  loving  tormented  his  sentimental 
heart,   he   tried   to   assuage   it   in   friendship.      He 


THE  CARTHAGE  STUDENT  97 

loved  friendship  as  he  loved  love.  He  was  a  passion- 
ate and  faithful  friend  up  to  his  death.  At  this  time 
of  his  life,  he  was  riveting  friendships  which  were 
never  to  be  broken.  He  had  beside  him  his  fellow- 
countryman,  Alypius,  the  future  Bishop  of  Thagaste, 
who  had  followed  him  to  Carthage  and  would,  later 
on,  follow  him  to  Milan  ;  Nebridius,  a  not  less  dear 
companion,  fated  to  die  early ;  Honoratus,  whom  he 
drew  into  his  errors  and  later  did  his  best  to  enlighten ; 
and,  finally,  that  mysterious  young  man,  whose  name 
he  does  not  tell  us,  and  whose  loss  he  mourned  as 
never  any  one  has  mourned  the  death  of  a  friend. 

They  lived  in  daily  and  hourly  intimac}^  in  con- 
tinual fervour  and  enthusiasm.  They  were  great 
theatre-goers,  where  Augustin  was  able  to  satisfy 
his  desire  for  tender  emotions  and  romantic  adven- 
tures. They  had  musical  parties ;  they  tried  over 
again  the  popular  airs  heard  at  the  Odeum  or  some 
other  of  the  innumerable  theatres  at  Carthage.  All 
the  Carthaginians,  even  the  populace,  were  mad 
about  music.  The  Bishop  of  Hippo,  in  his  sermons,  ] 
recalls  a  mason  upon  his  scaffolding,  or  a  shoemaker 
in  his  stall,  singing  awaj^  the  tunes  of  well-known 
musicians.  Then  our  students  strolled  on  the  quays, 
or  in  the  Harbour  Square,  contemplating  the  many- 
coloured  sea,  this  splendour  of  waters  at  the  setting 
sun,  which  Augustin  will  extol  one  day  with  an  in- 
spiration unknown  to  the  ancient  poets.  Above  all, 
they  fell  into  discussions,  commented  what  they  had 
lately  read,  or  built  up  astonishing  plans  for  the 
future.  So  flowed  by  a  happy  and  charming  life, 
abruptly  interpolated  with  superb  anticipations. 
With  what  a  full  heart  the  Christian  penitent  calls 
it  back  for  us  ! — "  What  delighted  me  in  the  inter- 


98  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

course  of  my  friends,  was  the  talk,  the  laughter,  the 
good  turns  we  did  each  other,  the  common  study 
of  the  masters  of  eloquence,  the  comradeship,  now 
grave  now  gay,  the  differences  that  left  no  sting,  as 
of  a  man  differing  with  himself,  the  spice  of  disagree- 
ment which  seasoned  the  monotony  of  consent. 
Each  by  turns  would  instruct  or  listen  ;  impatiently 
we  missed  the  absent  friend,  and  savoured  the  joy 
of  his  return.  We  loved  each  other  with  all  our  hearts, 
and  such  tokens  of  friendship  springing  from  the  heart 
and  displayed  by  a  word,  a  glance,  an  expression,  by 
a  thousand  pretty  complaisances,  supply  the  heat 
which  welds  souls  together,  and  of  many  make  one." 

It  is  easily  understood  that  such  ties  as  these 
had  given  Augustin  a  permanent  disgust  for  his 
rowdy  comrades  of  a  former  time  :  he  went  no  more 
with  "  The  Wreckers."  The  small  circle  he  took 
pleasure  in  was  quiet  and  cheerful.  Its  merriment 
was  controlled  by  the  African  gravity.  He  and  his 
friends  come  before  my  eyes,  a  little  like  those 
students  of  theology,  or  those  cultivated  young 
Arabs,  who  discuss  poetry,  lolling  indolently  upon 
the  cushions  of  a  divan,  while  they  roll  between  their 
fingers  the  amber  beads  of  their  rosary,  or  walking 
slowly  under  the  arcades  of  a  mosque,  draped  in  their 
white-silk  simars,  with  a  serious  and  meditative  air, 
gestures  elegant  and  measured,  courteous  and  har- 
monious speech,  and  something  discreet,  polite,  and 
already  clerical  in  their  tone  and  manners. 

In  fact,  the  life  which  Augustin  was  at  that  time 
relishing  was  the  pagan  life  on  its  best  and  gentlest 
side.  The  subtle  network  of  habits  and  daily  occu- 
pations enveloped  him  little  b}^  little.  There  was 
some  risk  of  his  growing  torpid  in  this  soft  kind  of 


THE   CARTHAGE   STUDENT  99 

life,  when  suddenly  a  rude  shock  roused  him.  .  .  . 
It  was  a  chance,  but  in  his  eyes  a  providential 
chance,  which  put  the  Hortensius  of  Cicero  between 
his  hands.  Augustin  was  about  nineteen,  still  a 
student  ;  according  to  the  order  which  prevailed  in 
the  schools,  the  time  had  come  for  him  to  read  and 
explain  this  philosophical  dialogue.  He  had  no 
curiosity  about  the  book.  He  took  it  from  his 
sense  of  duty  as  a  student,  because  it  figured  on 
the  schedule.  He  unrolled  the  book,  and  began 
it,  doubtless  with  calm  indifference.  All  of  a  sudden, 
a  great  unexpected  light  shone  between  the  lines. 
His  heart  throbbed.  His  whole  soul  sprang  towards 
these  phrases,  so  dazzling  and  revealing.  He  awoke 
from  his  long  drowsiness.  Before  him  shone  a 
marvellous  vision.  ...  As  this  dialogue  is  lost,  we 
can  hardly  to-day  account  for  such  enthusiasm,  and 
we  hold  that  the  Roman  orator  was  a  very  middling 
philosopher.  We  know,  however,  through  Augustin 
himself,  that  the  book  contained  an  eloquent  praise 
of  wisdom.  And  then,  words  are  naught  without  the 
soul  of  the  reader  ;  all  this,  falling  into  Augustin's 
soul,  rendered  a  prolonged  and  magnificent  sound. 
It  is  evident,  too,  that  just  at  the  moment  when  he 
unrolled  the  book  he  was  in  a  condition  to  receive 
this  uplifting  summons.  In  such  minutes,  when  the 
heart,  ignorant  of  itself,  swells  like  the  sea  before 
a  storm,  when  all  the  inner  riches  of  the  being  over- 
flow, the  slightest  glimmer  is  enough  to  reveal  all  these 
imprisoned  forces,  and  the  least  shock  to  set  them  free. 
He  has  at  least  preserved  for  us,  in  pious  and 
faithful  gratitude,  some  phrases  of  this  dialogue 
which  moved  him  so  deeply.  Especially  does  he 
admire  this  passage,   wherein  the  author,   after  a 


100  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

long  discussion,  ends  in  these  terms :  "If,  as  pre- 
tend the  philosophers  of  old  time,  who  are  also  the 
greatest  and  most  illustrious,  we  have  a  soul  im- 
mortal and  divine,  it  behoves  us  to  think,  that  the 
1  more  it  has  persevered  in  its  way,  that  is  to  say,  in 
11  reason,  love,  and  the  pursuit  of  truth,  and  the 
less  it  has  been  intermingled  and  stained  in  human 
error  and  passion,  the  easier  will  it  be  for  it  to  raise 
itself  and  soar  again  to  the  skies." 

Such  phrases,  read  in  a  certain  state  of  mind, 
might  well  overwhelm  this  young  man,  who  was 
ere  long  to  yearn  for  the  cloister  and  was  des- 
tined to  be  the  founder  of  African  monasticism.  To 
give  his  whole  life  to  the  study  of  wisdom,  to  com- 
pel himself  towards  the  contemplation  of  God,  to 
live  here  below  an  almost  divine  life — this  ideal, 
impossible  to  pagan  wisdom,  Augustin  was  called 
to  realize  in  the  name  of  Christ.  That  had  dawned 
on  him,  all  at  once,  while  he  was  reading  the  Hor- 
tensius.  And  this  ideal  appeared  to  him  so  beautiful, 
so  well  worth  the  sacrifice  of  all  he  had  hitherto 
loved,  that  nothing  else  counted  for  him  any  more. 
He  despised  rhetoric,  the  vain  studies  it  compelled 
him  to  pursue,  the  honour  and  glory  it  promised 
him.  What  was  all  that  to  the  prize  of  wisdom  ? 
For  wisdom  he  felt  himself  ready  to  give  up  the 
world.  .  .  .  But  these  heroic  outbursts  do  not,  as 
a  rule,  keep  up  very  long  in  natures  so  changeable 
and  impressionable  as  Augustin 's.  Yet  they  are 
not  entirely  thrown  away.  Thus,  in  early  youth,  come 
dim  revelations  of  the  future.  There  comes  a  pre- 
sentiment of  the  port  to  which  one  will  some  day 
be  sailing  ;  a  glimpse  of  the  task  to  fulfil,  the  work 
to  build  up  ;   and  all  this  rises  before  the  eyes  in  an 


THE  CARTHAGE  STUDENT     loi 

entrancement  of  the  whole  being.  Though  the 
bright  image  be  ecUpsed,  perhaps  for  years,  the  re- 
membrance of  it  persists  amid  the  worst  degrada- 
tions or  the  worst  mediocrities  He  who  one  single 
time  has  seen  it  pass,  can  never  afterwards  live 
quite  like  other  people. 

This  fever  calmed,  Augustin  set  himself  to  reflect. 
The  ancient  philosophers  promised  him  wisdom. 
But  Christ  also  promised  it  !  Was  it  not  possible 
to  reconcile  them  ?  And  was  not  the  Gospel  ideal 
essentially  more  human  than  that  of  the  pagan 
philosophers  ?  Suppose  he  tried  to  submit  to  that, 
to  bring  the  faith  of  his  childhood  into  line  with  his 
ambitions  as  a  young  man  of  intellect  ?  To  be  good 
after  the  manner  of  his  mother,  of  his  grandparents, 
of  the  good  Thagaste  servants,  of  all  the  humble 
Christian  souls  whose  virtues  he  had  been  taught  to 
respect,  and  at  the  same  time  to  rival  a  Plato  by 
the  strength  of  thought — what  a  dream  !  Was  it 
possible  ?  ...  He  tells  us  himself  that  the  illusion 
was  brief,  and  that  he  grew  cool  about  the  Hor- 
tensius  because  he  did  not  find  the  name  of  Christ 
in  it.  He  deceives  himself,  probably.  At  this  time 
he  was  not  so  Christian.  He  yields  to  the  tempta- 
tion of  a  fine  phrase  :  when  he  wrote  his  Confessions 
he  had  not  yet  entirely  lost  this  habit. 

But  what  remains  true  is,  that  feeling  the  in- 
adequateness  of  pagan  philosophy,  he  returned  for 
a  moment  towards  Christianity.  The  Ciceronian 
dialogue,  by  disappointing  his  thirst  for  the  truth, 
gave  him  the  idea  of  knocking  at  the  door  of  the 
Church  and  trying  to  find  out  if  on  that  side  there 
might  not  be  a  practicable  road  for  him.  This  is 
why  the  reading  of  Hortensius  is  in  Augustin's  eyes 


102  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

one  of  the  great  dates  of  his  life.  Although  he  fell 
back  in  his  errors,  he  takes  credit  for  his  effort.  He 
recognizes  in  it  the  first  sign,  and,  as  it  were,  a 
promise  of  his  conversion.  "  Thenceforth,  my  God, 
began  my  upward  way,  and  my  return  towards  Thee.'* 

He  began  then  to  study  the  Holy  Scriptures  with 
a  more  or  less  serious  intention  to  instruct  himself 
in  them.  But  to  go  to  the  Bible  by  way  of  Cicero 
was  to  take  the  worst  road.  Augustin  got  lost  there. 
This  direct  popular  style,  which  only  cares  about 
saying  things,  and  not  about  how  they  are  said, 
could  onl}^  repel  the  pupil  of  Carthage  rhetoricians, 
the  imitator  of  the  harmonious  Ciceronian  sentences. 
Not  only  had  he  much  too  spoiled  a  taste  in  litera- 
ture, but  there  was  also  too  much  literature  in  this 
pose  of  a  young  man  who  starts  off  one  fine  morning 
to  conquer  wisdom.  He  was  punished  for  his  lack  of 
sincerity,  and  especially  of  humility.  He  understood 
nothing  of  the  Scripture,  and  "  I  found  it,"  he  says, 
"  a  thing  not  known  to  the  proud,  nor  yet  laid  open 
to  children,  but  poor  in  appearance,  lofty  in  operation, 
and  veiled  in  mysteries.  At  that  time,  I  was  not  the 
man  to  bow  my  head  so  as  to  pass  in  at  its  door."  .  .  . 

He  grew  tired  very  quickly.  He  turned  his  back 
on  the  Bible,  as  he  had  thrown  aside  Hortensius, 
and  he  went  to  find  pasture  elsewhere.  Neverthe- 
less, his  mind  had  been  set  in  motion.  Nevermore 
was  he  to  know  repose,  till  he  had  found  truth.  He 
demanded  this  truth  from  all  the  sects  and  all  the 
churches.  So  it  was,  that  in  despair  he  flung  him- 
self into  Manicheeism. 

Some  have  professed  amazement  that  this  honest 
and  practical  mind  should  have  stuck  fast  in  a  doc- 
trine so  tortuous,   so  equivocal,   contaminated  by 


THE  CARTHAGE  STUDENT     103 

fancies  so  grossly  absurd.  But  perhaps  it  is  forgot- 
ten that  there  was  everything  in  Manicheeism. 
The  leaders  of  the  sect  did  not  deliver  the  bulk  of 
the  doctrine  all  at  once  to  their  catechumens  ;  the 
entire  initiation  was  a  matter  of  several  degrees. 
Now  Augustin  never  went  higher  than  a  simple 
auditor  in  the  Manichean  Church.  What  attracted 
specially  fine  minds  to  the  Manichees,  was  that  they 
began  by  declaring  themselves  rationalists.  To 
reconcile  faith  with  natural  science  and  philosophy 
has  been  the  fad  of  heresiarchs  and  free-thinkers 
in  all  ages.  The  Manicheans  bragged  that  they  had 
succeeded.  They  went  everywhere,  crying  out  : 
"  Truth,  Truth  !  "  That  suited  Augustin  very  well : 
it  was  just  what  he  was  looking  for.  He  hastened 
to  the  preachings  of  these  humbugs,  impatient  to 
receive  at  last  this  "  truth,"  so  noisily  announced. 
From  what  they  said,  it  was  contained  in  several 
large  books  written  by  their  prophet  under  the 
guidance  of  the  Holy  Ghost.  There  was  quite  a 
library  of  them.  By  way  of  bamboozling  the  crowd, 
they  produced  some  of  them  which  looked  very 
important,  ponderous  as  Tables  of  the  Law,  richly 
bound  in  vellum,  and  embellished  with  striking 
illuminations.  How  was  it  possible  to  doubt  that 
the  entire  revelation  was  contained  in  such  beauti- 
ful books  ?  One  felt  at  once  full  of  respect  for  a 
religion  which  was  able  to  produce  in  its  favour  the 
testimony  of  such  a  mass  of  writings. 

However,  the  priests  did  not  open  them.  To 
allay  the  impatience  of  their  hearers,  they  amused 
them  by  criticizing  the  books  and  dogmas  of  the 
Catholics.  This  preliminary  criticism  was  the  first 
lesson  of  their  instruction.     The}^  pointed  out  any 


104  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

number  of  incoherences,  absurdities,  and  interpola- 
tions in  the  Bible  :  according  to  them,  a  great  part 
of  the  Scriptures  had  been  foisted  on  the  world  by 
the  Jews.  But  they  triumphed  especially  in  detect- 
ing the  contradictions  of  the  Gospel  narratives. 
They  sapped  them  with  syllogisms.  It  is  easy  to 
understand  that  these  exercises  in  logic  should  have 
at  once  attracted  the  youthful  Augustin.  With  his 
extraordinary  dialectical  subtilty,  he  soon  became 
very  good  at  it  himself — much  better  even  than 
his  masters.  He  made  speeches  in  their  assemblies, 
fenced  against  a  text,  peremptoril}/  refuted  it,  and 
reduced  his  adversaries  to  silence.  He  was  applauded, 
covered  with  praise.  A  religion  which  brought  him 
such  successes  must  be  the  true  one. 

After  he  became  a  bishop,  he  tried  to  explain  to  him- 
self how  it  was  that  he  fell  into  Manicheeism,  and  could 
find  only  two  reasons.  "  The  first,"  he  says,  "  was  a 
friendship  which  took  hold  of  me  under  I  know  not 
what  appearance  of  kindness,  and  was  like  a  cord 
about  my  neck.  .  .  .  The  second  was  those  unhappj^ 
victories  that  I  almost  always  won  in  our  disputes." 

But  there  is  still  another  which  he  mentions  else- 
where, and  it  had  perhaps  the  most  weight.  This 
was  the  loose  moral  code  which  Manicheeism  author- 
ized. This  doctrine  taught  that  we  are  not  respon- 
sible for  the  evil  we  do.  Our  sins  and  vices  are  the 
work  of  the  evil  Principle — the  God  of  Darkness, 
enemy  of  the  God  of  Light.  Now  at  the  moment 
when  Augustin  was  received  as  auditor  by  the 
Manichees,  he  had  a  special  need  of  excusing  his 
conduct  by  a  moral  system  so  convenient  and 
indulgent.  He  had  just  formed  his  connection  with 
her  who  was  to  become  the  mother  of  his  child. 


IV 

THE   SWEETNESS   OF   TEARS 

AUGUSTIN  was  nearly  twenty.  He  had  finished 
^  his  studies  in  rhetoric  within  the  required  time. 
According  to  the  notions  of  that  age,  a  young  man 
ought  to  have  conchided  his  course  by  his  twentieth 
year.  If  not,  he  was  considered  past  mending  and 
sent  back  there  and  then  to  his  family. 

It  may  appear  surprising  that  a  gifted  student 
like  Augustin  did  not  finish  his  rhetoric  course  sooner. 
But  after  his  terms  at  Madaura,  he  had  lost  nearly  a 
year  at  Thagaste.  Besides,  the  life  of  Carthage  had 
so  many  charms  for  him  that  doubtless  he  was  in  no 
hurry  to  leave.  However  that  may  be,  the  moment 
was  now  come  for  him  to  make  up  his  mind  about 
his  career.  The  wishes  of  his  parents,  the  advice  of 
his  masters,  as  well  as  his  own  ambitions  and 
qualities,  urged  him,  as  we  know,  to  become  a 
barrister.  But  now,  suddenly,  all  his  projects  for 
the  future  changed.  Not  only  did  he  give  up  the 
law,  but  at  the  very  moment  when  all  appeared  to 
smile  on  him,  at  the  opening  of  his  youth,  he  left 
Carthage  to  go  and  bury  himself  as  a  teacher  of 
grammar  in  the  little  free-town  his  birthplace. 

As  he  has  neglected  to  give  any  explanation  of 
this  sudden  determination,  we  are  reduced  to  con- 
jectures. It  is  likely  that  his  mother  was  bothered 
about    household    expenses    and    could    no    longer 


io6  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

afford  to  keep  him  at  Carthage.  Besides,  she  had 
other  children,  a  son  and  daughter,  to  start  in  hfe. 
Augustin  was  on  the  point  of  being,  if  not  poor,  at 
least  very  hard  up.  He  must  do  something  to  earn 
his  living,  and  as  quickly  as  possible.  In  these 
conditions,  the  quickest  way  out  of  the  difficulty 
was  to  sell  to  others  what  he  had  bought  from  his 
masters.  To  live,  he  would  open  a  word-shop,  as  he 
calls  it  disdainfully.  But  as  he  had  only  just  ceased 
to  be  a  student,  he  could  not  dream  of  becoming  a 
professor  in  a  great  city  such  as  Carthage,  and  setting 
himself  up  in  rivalry  to  so  many  celebrated  masters. 
The  best  thing  he  could  do,  if  he  did  not  want  to 
vegetate,  was  to  fall  back  on  some  more  modest 
post.  Now  his  protector,  Romanianus,  wanted  him 
to  go  to  Thagaste.  This  rich  man  had  a  son  almost 
grown  up,  whom  it  was  necessary  to  put  as  soon  as 
possible  in  the  hands  of  a  tutor.  Augustin,  so  often 
helped  by  the  father,  was  naturally  thought  of  to 
look  after  the  youth.  Furthermore,  Romanianus, 
who  appreciated  Augustin's  talent,  must  have  been 
anxious  to  attract  him  to  Thagaste  and  keep  him 
there.  With  an  eye  to  the  interests  of  his  free-town, 
he  desired  to  have  such  a  shining  light  in  the  place. 
So  he  asked  this  young  man,  whom  he  patronized, 
to  return  to  his  native  district  and  open  a  grammar 
school.  He  promised  him  pupils,  and,  above  all, 
the  support  of  his  influence,  which  was  considerable. 
Monnica,  as  we  may  conjecture,  added  her  entreaties 
to  those  of  the  great  head  of  the  Thagaste  munici- 
pality.   Augustin  yielded. 

Did  it  grieve  him  very  much  to  make  up  his  mind 
to  this  exile  ?  It  must  have  been  extremely  .hard 
for  a  young  man  of  twenty  to  give  up  Carthage  and 


THE  SWEETNESS   OF  TEARS         107 

its  pleasures.  Moreover,  it  is  pretty  nearly  certain 
that  at  this  time  he  had  already  started  that  con- 
nection which  was  to  last  so  long.  To  leave  a  mis- 
tress whom  he  loved,  and  that  in  all  the  freshness 
of  a  passion  just  beginning — one  wonders  how  he 
was  able  to  make  up  his  mind  to  it.  And  yet  he 
did  leave,  and  spent  nearly  a  year  at  Thagaste. 

One  pecuhar  mark  of  the  youth,  and  even  of  the 
whole  life  of  Augustin,  is  the  ease  with  which  he 
unlearns  and  breaks  off  his  habits — the  sentimental 
as  well  as  the  intellectual.  He  used  up  a  good  many 
doctrines  before  resting  in  the  Catholic  truth  ;  and 
even  afterwards,  in  the  course  of  a  long  life,  he 
contradicted  and  corrected  himself  more  than  once 
in  his  controversies  and  theological  writings.  His 
Retractations  prove  this.  One  might  say  that  the 
accustomed  weighs  on  him  as  a  hindrance  to  his 
liberty  ;  that  the  look  of  the  places  where  he  lives 
becomes  hateful  to  him  as  a  threat  of  servitude. 
He  feels  dimly  that  his  true  country  is  elsewhere, 
and  that  if  he  must  settle  anywhere  it  is  in  the  house 
of  his  Heavenly  Father.  Inquietum  est  cor  nostrum, 
donee  requiescat  in  te  .  .  .  "  Restless  are  our  hearts, 
O  my  God,  until  they  rest  in  Thee."  Long  before 
St.  Francis  of  Assisi,  he  practised  the  mystic  rule  : 
"  As  a  stranger  and  a  pilgrim."  It  is  true  that  in 
his  twentieth  year  he  was  very  far  from  being  a 
mystic.  But  he  already  felt  that  restlessness  which 
made  him  cross  the  sea  and  roam  Italy  from  Rome 
to  Milan.  He  is  an  impulsive.  He  cannot  resist 
the  mirages  of  his  heart  or  his  imagination.  He  is 
always  ready  to  leave.  The  road  and  its  chances 
tempt  him.  He  is  eager  for  the  unknown.  He  lets 
himself  be  carried  in  delight  by  the  blowing  wind. 


io8  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

God  calls  him  ;  he  obeys  without  knowing  where 
he  goes.  This  unsettled  young  man,  halting  between 
contrary  passions,  who  feels  at  home  nowhere,  has 
already  the  soul  of  an  apostle. 

This  changeableness  of  mood  was  probably  the 
true  cause  of  his  departure  for  Thagaste.  But  other 
more  apparent  reasons,  reasons  more  patent  to  a 
juvenile  consciousness,  guided  him  also.  No  doubt 
he  was  not  sorry  to  reappear  in  his  little  town, 
although  he  was  so  young,  with  the  importance  and 
authority  of  a  master.  His  former  companions 
were  going  to  become  his  pupils.  And  then  the 
Manichees  had  fanaticized  him.  Carried  away  by 
the  neophyte's  bubbling  zeal,  elevated  by  his 
triumphs  at  the  public  meetings  in  Carthage,  he 
meant  to  shine  before  his  fellow-countrymen,  and 
perhaps  convert  them.  He  departed  with  his  mind 
made  up  to  proselytize.  Let  us  believe  also,  that 
in  spite  of  his  dissolute  life,  and  the  new  passion 
that  filled  his  heart,  he  did  not  come  back  to  Thagaste 
without  an  affectionate  thought  at  the  back  of  his 
head  for  his  mother. 

The  reception  that  Monnica  had  in  reserve  for 
him  was  going  to  surprise  him  considerably.  Since 
her  widowhood,  the  wife  of  Patricius  had  singularly 
advanced  in  the  way  of  Christian  perfection.  The 
early  Church  not  only  offered  widows  the  moral  help 
of  its  sacraments  and  consolations,  it  also  granted 
a  special  dignity  with  certain  privileges  to  those  who 
made  a  vow  to  refrain  from  sex-intercourse.  They 
had  in  the  basilicas,  even  as  the  consecrated  virgins, 
a  place  of  honour,  divided  from  that  of  the  other 
matrons  by  a  balustrade.  They  wore  a  special  dress. 
They  were  obliged  to  a  conduct  which  would  shew 


THE  SWEETNESS   OF  TEARS         109 

them  worthy  of  all  the  outer  marks  of  respect  which 
surrounded  them.  The  austerity  of  Monnica  had 
increased  with  the  zeal  of  her  faith.  She  set  an 
example  to  the  Church  people  at  Thagaste.  Docile 
to  the  teachings  of  her  priests,  eager  to  serve  her 
brethren,  multiplying  alms  as  much  as  she  could 
with  her  straitened  means,  she  was  unfailing  at  the 
services  of  the  Church.  Twice  daily,  morning  and 
evening,  she  might  be  seen,  exact  to  the  hour  of 
prayer  and  sermon.  She  did  not  go  there,  her  son 
assures  us,  to  mingle  in  cabals  and  the  gossip  of  pious 
females,  but  to  hear  God's  word  in  homily,  and  that 
God  might  hear  her  in  prayer. 

The  widow  compelled  all  who  were  about  her  to 
the  same  severe  rule  which  she  herself  observed. 
In  this  rigid  atmosphere  of  his  home,  the  student 
from  Carthage,  with  his  free,  fashionable  airs,  must 
have  caused  a  painful  astonishment.  Monnica  felt 
at  once  that  she  and  her  son  understood  each  other 
no  longer.  She  began  by  remonstrating  with  him. 
Augustin  rebelled.  Things  got  worse  when,  with 
his  presumption  of  the  young  professor  new-enamelled 
by  the  schools,  the  harsh  and  aggressive  assurance 
of  the  heresiarch,  he  boasted  as  loud  as  he  could  of 
being  a  Manichee.  Monnica,  deeply  wounded  in 
her  piety  and  motherly  tenderness,  ordered  him  to 
give  up  his  errors.  He  refused,  and  only  replied  by 
sarcasms  to  the  poor  woman's  complaints.  Then 
she  must  have  believed  that  the  separation  was 
final,  that  Augustin  had  committed  an  irreparable 
crime.  Being  an  African  Christian,  absolute  in  her 
faith  and  passionate  for  its  defence,  she  regarded 
her  son  as  a  public  danger.  She  was  filled  with 
horror  at   his   treason.      It  is  possible,   too,   that 


no  SAINT   AUGUSTIN 

guided  by  the  second-sight  of  her  affection,  she  saw 
clearer  into  Augustin's  heart  than  he  did  himself. 
She  was  plunged  in  sorrow  that  he  mistook  himself 
to  this  extent,  and  refused  the  Grace  which  desired 
to  win  him  to  the  Catholic  unity.  And  as  he  was  not 
content  with  losing  himself,  but  also  drew  others 
into  peril — disputing,  speech-making  before  his 
friends,  abusing  his  power  of  language  to  throw 
trouble  into  consciences — Monnica  finally  made  up 
her  mind.  She  forbade  her  son  to  eat  at  her  table, 
or  to  sleep  under  her  roof.  She  drove  him  from  the 
house. 

This  must  have  been  a  big  scandal  in  Thagaste. 
It  does  not  appear,  however,  that  Augustin  cared 
much.  In  all  the  conceit  of  his  false  knowledge,  he 
had  that  kind  of  inhumanity  which  drives  the  in- 
tellectual to  make  htter  of  the  sweetest  and  deepest 
feelings  as  a  sacrifice  to  his  abstract  idol.  Not  only 
did  he  not  mind  very  much  if  his  apostas}^  made  his 
mother  weep,  but  he  did  not  trouble,  either,  to 
reconcile  the  chimeras  of  his  brain  with  the  living 
reality  of  his  soul  and  the  things  of  hfe.  Whatever 
he  found  inconvenient,  he  tranquilly  denied,  content 
if  he  had  talked  well  and  entangled  his  adversary  in 
the  net  of  his  syllogisms. 

Put  in  interdict  by  Monnica,  he  simply  went  and 
quartered  himself  on  Romanianus.  The  sumptuous 
hospitality  he  received  there  very  soon  consoled 
him  for  his  exile  from  his  home.  And  if  his  self- 
esteem  had  been  affronted,  the  pride  of  hving  fami- 
liarly with  so  important  a  personage  was,  for  a  vain 
young  man,  a  very  full  compensation. 
r  In  fact,  this  Romanianus  roused  the  admiration 
of  the  whole  country  by  his  luxury  and  lavish  ex- 


THE  SWEETNESS  OF  TEARS         iii 

penditure.  He  was  bound  to  ruin  himself  in  the 
long  run,  or,  at  any  rate,  to  raise  up  envious  people 
bent  upon  his  ruin.  Being  at  the  head  of  the  De- 
curions,  he  was  the  protector,  not  only  of  Thagaste, 
but  of  the  neighbouring  towns.  He  was  the  great 
patron,  the  influential  man,  who  had  nearly  the 
whole  country  for  his  dependents.  The  town 
council,  through  gratitude  and  flattery,  had  had  his 
name  engraved  upon  tables  of  brass,  and  had  put 
up  statues  to  him.  It  had  even  conferred  powers 
on  him  wider  than  municipal  powers.  The  truth 
is  that  Romanianus  did  not  dole  out  his  benefac- 
tions to  his  fellow-citizens.  He  gave  them  bear- 
fights  and  other  spectacles  till  then  unknown  at 
Thagaste.  He  did  not  grudge  public  banquets,  and 
every  day  a  free  meal  was  to  be  got  at  his  house. 
The  guests  were  served  plentifully.  After  having 
eaten  his  dinner,  they  dipped  in  the  purse  of  the 
host.  Romanianus  knew  the  art  of  doing  an  obliging 
thing  discreetly,  and  even  how  to  anticipate  re- 
quests which  might  be  painful.  So  he  was  pro- 
claimed unanimously,  "  the  most  humane,  the  most 
liberal,  the  most  polite  and  happiest  of  men." 

Generous  to  his  dependents,  he  did  not  forget 
himself.  He  built  a  villa  which,  by  the  space 
it  occupied,  was  a  real  palace,  with  thermcB  walled 
in  precious  marbles.  He  passed  his  time  in  the 
baths,  or  gaming,  or  hunting — in  short,  he  led  the 
life  of  a  great  landed  proprietor  of  those  days. 

No  doubt  these  villas  had  neither  the  beauty 
nor  the  art-value  of  the  great  Italian  villas,  which 
were  a  kind  of  museums  in  a  pretty,  or  grand, 
natural  frame ;  but  they  did  not  lack  charm. 
Some  of  them,  like  that  of  Romanianus,  were  built 


\[\ 


112  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

and  decorated  at  lavish  expense.  Immensely  large, 
they  took  in  sometimes  an  entire  village ;  and 
sometimes,  also,  the  villa,  properly  speaking,  the 
part  of  the  building  where  the  master  dwelt,  was 
fortified,  closed  in  by  walls  and  towers  like  a  feudal 
castle.  Upon  the  outer  gates  and  the  entrance  door 
might  be  read  in  big  letters  :  "  The  Property  of  So- 
and-so."  Often,  the  inscription  was  repeated  upon 
the  walls  of  an  enclosure  or  of  a  farm,  which  really 
belonged  to  a  dependent  of  the  great  man.  Under 
the  shelter  of  the  lord's  name,  these  small-holders 
defended  themselves  better  against  fiscal  tyranny, 
or  were  included  in  the  immunities  of  their  patrons. 
So  was  formed,  under  the  cover  of  patronage,  a 
sort  of  African  feudalism.  Augustin's  father,  who 
owned  vineyards,  was  certainly  a  vassal  of  Romani- 
anus. 

As  the  African  villa  was  a  centre  of  agricultural 
activity,  it  maintained  on  the  estate  a  whole  popula- 
tion of  slaves,  workmen,  and  small-holders.  The 
chief  herdsman's  house  neighboured  that  of  the 
forester.  Through  deer-parks,  enclosed  by  latticed 
fences,  wandered  gazelles.  Oil  factories,  vats  and 
cellars  for  wine,  ran  on  from  the  bath-buildings  and 
the  offices.  Then  there  was  the  main  building  with 
its  immense  doorway,  its  belvedere  of  many  stories, 
as  in  the  Roman  villas,  its  interior  galleries,  and 
wings  to  the  right  and  left  of  the  atrium.  In  front 
lay  the  terraces,  the  gardens  with  straight  walks 
formed  by  closely-clipped  hedges  of  box  which  led 
to  pools  and  jets  of  water,  to  arbours  covered  with 
ivy,  to  nymph-fountains  ornamented  with  columns 
and  statues.  In  these  gardens  was  a  particular  place 
called  the   "  philosopher's  corner."     The   mistress 


THE   SWEETNESS   OF  TEARS         113 

of  the  house  used  to  go  there  to  read  or  dream. 
Her  chair,  or  folding-seat,  was  placed  under  the  shade 
of  a  palm  tree .   Her  ' '  philosopher ' '  followed  her,  hold-    > 
ing  her  parasol  and  leading  her  little  favourite  dog.      —^ 

It  is  easy  to  realize  that  Augustin  managed  to 
stand  his  mother's  severity  without  overmuch  dis- 
tress in  one  of  these  fine  country  houses.  To  be 
comfortable  there,  he  had  only  to  follow  his  natural 
inclination,  which  was,  he  tells  us,  epicureanism.  It 
is  most  certain  that  at  this  period  the  only  thing  he 
cared  about  and  sought  after  was  pleasure.  Staying 
with  Romanianus,  he  took  his  share  in  all  the  pleasant 
things  of  life,  suavitates  illius  vitcB — shared  the 
amusements  of  his  host,  and  only  bothered  about 
his  pupils  when  he  had  nothing  better  to  do.  He 
must  have  been  as  little  of  a  grammarian  as  possible 
— he  hadn't  the  time.  With  the  tyrannical  friend- 
ship of  rich  people,  who  are  hard  put  to  it  to  find 
occupation,  Romanianus  doubtless  monopolized  him 
from  morning  till  night.  They  hunted  together,  or 
dined,  or  read  poetry,  or  discussed  in  the  evergreen 
alleys  of  the  garden  or  "the  philosopher's  corner." 
And  naturally,  the  recent  convert  to  Manicheeism 
did  his  best  to  indoctrinate  and  convert  his  patron 
— so  far  at  least  as  a  careless  man  like  Romanianus 
could  be  converted.  Augustin  accuses  himself  of 
having  "  flung  "  Romanianus  into  his  own  errors. 
Augustin  probably  was  not  so  guilty.  His  wealthy 
friend  does  not  seem  to  have  had  any  very  firm  con- 
victions. In  all  likelihood,  he  was  a  pagan,  a 
sceptical  or  hesitating  pagan,  such  as  existed  in 
numbers  at  that  time.  Led  by  Augustin,  he  drew 
near  to  Manicheeism.  Then,  when  Augustin  gave 
up   Manicheeism   for   Platonic   philosophy,    we   see 


114  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

Romanianus  take  the  airs  of  a  philosopher.  Later, 
when  Augustin  came  back  to  Cathohcism,  he  drew 
Romanianus  in  his  wake  towards  that  reUgion.  This 
man  of  fashion  was  one  of  those  frivolous  people 
who  never  go  deep  into  things,  for  whom  ideas  are 
only  a  pastime,  and  who  consider  philosophers  or 
men  of  letters  as  amusers.  But  it  is  certain  that 
he  liked  to  listen  to  Augustin,  and  let  himself  be 
influenced.  If  he  trifled  with  Manicheeism,  the 
reason  was  that  Augustin  dazzled  him  with  his 
arguments  and  fine  phrases.  This  orator  of  twenty 
had  already  extraordinary  charm. 

So  Augustin  led  a  delightful  life  with  Romanianus. 
Everything  pleased  him — his  talking  triumphs,  the 
admiration  of  his  hearers,  the  flatter}^  and  luxury 
which  surrounded  him.  Meanwhile,  Monnica  was 
plunged  in  grief  at  his  conduct,  and  implored  God 
to  draw  him  from  his  errors.  She  began  to  be  sorry 
that  she  had  sent  him  away,  and  with  the  clear- 
sightedness of  the  Christian,  she  perceived  that 
Romanianus'  house  was  not  good  for  the  prodigal. 
It  would  be  better  to  have  him  back.  Near  her  he 
would  run  less  risk  of  being  corrupted.  Through 
intense  praying,  came  to  her  a  dream  which 
quickened  her  determination.  "  She  dreamed  that 
she  was  weeping  and  lamenting,  with  her  feet 
planted  on  a  wooden  rule,  when  she  saw  coming 
towards  her  a  radiant  youth  who  smiled  upon  her 
cheerfully.  He  asked  the  reason  of  her  sorrow  and 
her  daily  tears  .  .  .  and  when  she  told  him  she 
was  bewailing  my  perdition,  he  bade  her  be  of  good 
comfort,  look  and  sec,  for  where  she  was,  there  was 
I  also.  She  looked,  and  saw  me  standing  by  her  side 
on  the  same  rule." 


THE  SWEETNESS  OF  TEARS         115 

Filled  with  joy  by  this  promise  from  on  high, 
Monnica  asked  her  son  to  come  home.  He  did  come 
back,  but  with  the  quibbles  of  the  Sophist,  the 
rhetorician  cavilled  against  his  mother.  He  tried 
to  upset  her  happiness.     He  said  to  her  : 

"  Since,  according  to  your  dream,  we  are  to 
be  both  standing  on  the  same  rule,  that  means 
that  you  are  going  to  be  a  Manichean." 

"  No,"  answered  Monnica.  "  He  did  not  say, 
where  he  is  you  will  be,  but  where  you  are  he  will  be." 

Augustin  confesses  that  this  strong  good  sense 
made  a  certain  impression  on  him.  Nevertheless 
he  did  not  change.  For  still  nine  years  he  remained 
a  Manichee. 

As  a  last  resource,  Monnica  begged  a  bishop  she 
knew,  a  man  deeply  read  in  the  Scriptures,  to  speak 
with  her  son  and  refute  his  errors.  But  so  great 
was  the  reputation  of  Augustin  as  an  orator  and 
dialectician  that  the  holy  man  dared  not  try  a  fall 
with  such  a  vigorous  j  ouster.  He  answered  the 
mother  very  wisely,  that  a  mind  so  subtle  and 
acute  could  not  long  continue  in  such  gross  sophisms. 
And  he  offered  his  own  example,  for  he,  too,  had  been 
a  Manichee.  But  Monnica  pressed  him  with  en- 
treaties and  tears.  At  last  the  bishop,  annoyed  by 
her  persistence,  but  at  the  same  time  moved  by  her 
tears,  answered  with  a  roughness  mingled  with 
kindness  and  compassion  : 

"  Go,  go  !  Leave  me  alone.  Live  on  as  you  are 
living.  It  cannot  be  that  the  son  of  such  tears 
should  be  lost." 

Filius  istarum  lacrymarum :  the  son  of  such 
tears  !  .  .  .  Was  it  indeed  the  country  bishop,  or 
rather  the  rhetorician  Augustin  who,  in  a  burst  of 


ii6  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

gratitude,  hit  upon  this  subHme  sentence  ?  Certain 
it  is  that  later  on  Augustin  saw  in  his  mother's  tears 
as  it  were  a  first  baptism  whence  he  came  forth  re- 
generate. After  having  borne  him  according  to  the 
flesh,  Monnica,  by  her  tears  and  moans,  gave  him 
birth  into  the  spiritual  life.  Monnica  wept  because 
of  Augustin.  Monnica  wept  for  Augustin.  This  is 
rather  astonishing  in  the  case  of  so  severe  a  mother 
— this  African  a  trifle  rough.  The  expressions — 
tears  and  moans  and  weeping — occur  so  often  in 
her  son's  writings,  that  we  are  at  first  tempted  to 
take  them  for  pious  metaphors — figures  of  a  sacred 
rhetoric.  We  suspect  that  Monnica's  tears  must 
come  from  the  Bible,  an  imitation  of  King  David's 
penitential  tears.  But  it  would  be  quite  an  error 
to  believe  that.  Monnica  wept  real  tears.  In  her 
whole-hearted  prayers  she  bedewed  the  pavement 
of  the  basilica ;  she  moistened  the  balustrade 
against  which  she  leant  her  forehead.  This  austere 
woman,  this  widow  whose  face  nobody  saw  any 
more,  whose  body  was  shapeless  by  reason  of  the 
mass  of  stuffs,  grey  and  black,  which  wrapped  her 
from  head  to  foot — this  rigid  Christian  concealed  a 
heart  full  of  love.  Love  such  as  this  was  then  a 
perfectly  new  thing. 

That  an  African  woman  should  carry  her  piety 
to  the  point  of  fanaticism  ;  that  she  should  work 
to  conquer  her  son  to  her  faith  ;  that,  if  he  strayed 
from  it,  she  should  hate  him  and  drive  him  out  with 
curses — this  has  been  seen  in  Africa  at  all  times. 
But  that  a  mother  should  mourn  at  the  thought  that 
her  child  is  lost  for  another  life  ;  that  she  grows 
terror-stricken  and  despairing  when  she  thinks  that 
she  may  possess  a  happiness  in  which  he  will  have 


THE   SWEETNESS   OF  TEARS         117 

no  part,  and  walk  in  the  gardens  of  Heaven  while 
her  child  will  not  be  there — no,  this  had  never 
been  seen  before.  "  Where  I  am  you  will  be,"  near 
me,  against  my  heart,  our  two  hearts  meeting  in  the 
one  same  love — in  this  union  of  souls,  continued 
beyond  the  grave,  lies  all  the  Christian  sweetness 
and  hope. 

Augustin  was  no  longer,  or  not  yet,  a  Christian. 
But  in  his  tears  he  is  the  true  son  of  his  mother. 
This  gift  of  tears  that  Saint  Lewis  of  France  begged 
God  with  so  much  earnestness  and  contrition  to 
grant  him,  Monnica's  son  had  to  the  full.  "  For  him 
to  weep  was  a  pleasure."*  He  inebriated  himself 
with  his  tears.  Now,  just  while  he  was  at  Thagaste, 
he  lost  a  friend  whom  he  loved  intensely.  This 
death  set  free  the  fountain  of  tears.  They  are  not 
yet  the  holy  tears  which  he  will  shed  later  before 
God,  but  only  poor  human  tears,  more  pathetic 
perhaps  to  our  own  weakness. 

Who  was  this  friend  ?  He  tells  us  in  very  vague 
terms.  We  only  know  that  they  had  grown  up  as 
boys  together  and  had  gone  to  the  same  schools ; 
that  they  had  just  passed  a  year  together,  probably 
at  Carthage ;  that  this  young  man,  persuaded  by 
him,  was  become  a  Manichee ;  and  that,  in  a  word, 
they  loved  passionately.  Augustin,  while  speaking 
of  him,  recalls  in  a  deeper  sense  what  Horace  said  | 
of  his  friend  Virgil  :  dimidium  animce — "  O  thou 
half  of  my  soul !  " 

Well,  this  young  man  fell  gravely  sick  of  a  fever. 
As  all  hope  was  at  an  end,  they  baptized  him, 
according  to  the  custom.  He  grew  better,  was 
almost  cured.     "  As  soon  as  I  was  able  to  talk  to 

*  Sainte-Beuve. 


ii8  SAINT   AUGUSTIN 

him,"  says  Augustin — "  and  that  was  as  soon  as 
he  could  bear  it,  for  I  never  left  his  side,  and  we 
were  bound  up  in  one  another — I  ventured  a  jest, 
thinking  that  he  would  jest  too,  about  the  baptism 
which  he  had  received,  when  he  could  neither  think 
nor  feel.  But  by  this  time  he  had  been  told  of  his 
baptism.  He  shrank  from  me  as  from  an  enemy, 
and  with  a  wonderful  new-found  courage,  warned 
me  never  to  speak  so  to  him  again,  if  I  wished  to 
remain  his  friend.  I  was  so  astounded  and  con- 
fused that  I  said  no  more,  resolving  to  wait  till 
he  should  regain  his  strength,  when  I  would  tell 
him  frankly  what  I  thought." 

So,  at  this  serious  moment,  he  whom  they  called 
"  the  Carthaginian  disputer  "  was  sorry  not  to  be 
able  to  measure  himself  in  a  bout  of  dialectics  with 
his  half-dead  friend.  The  intellectual  poison  had 
so  perverted  his  mind,  that  it  almost  destroyed  in 
him  the  feelings  of  common  decency.  But  if  his 
head,  as  he  acknowledges,  was  ver}^  much  spoiled, 
his  heart  remained  intact.  His  friend  died  a  few 
days  after,  and  Augustin  was  not  there.  He  was 
stunned  by  it. 

His  grief  wrought  itself  up  to  wildness  and  despair. 
"  This  sorrow  fell  like  darkness  on  my  heart,  and 
wherever  I  looked  I  saw  nothing  but  death.  My 
country  became  a  torture,  my  father's  house  a 
misery.  All  the  pleasures  that  I  had  shared  with 
him,  turned  into  hideous  anguish  now  that  he 
was  gone.  My  eyes  sought  for  him  everywhere,  and 
found  him  not.  I  hated  the  familiar  scenes  because 
he  was  not  there,  and  they  could  no  more  cry  to 
me,  *  Lo  !  he  will  come,'  as  they  used  when  he 
was  absent  but  alive.  ..."     Then  Augustin  began 


THE  SWEETNESS   OF  TEARS         119 

to  weep  louder,  he  prolonged  his  weeping,  finding 
consolation  only  in  tears.  Monnica's  tenderness  was 
restrained ;  in  him  it  was  given  full  vent  and  ex- 
aggerated. At  that  time,  the  Christian  moderation 
was  unknown  to  him,  as  well  as  the  measure  which 
the  good  taste  of  the  ancients  prompted.  He  has 
often  been  compared  to  the  most  touching  geniuses, 
to  Virgil,  to  Racine,  who  had  also  the  gift  of  tears. 
But  Augustin's  tenderness  is  more  abandoned, 
and,  so  to  speak,  more  romantic.  It  even  works 
up,  sometimes,  into  an  unhealthy  excitement. 

To  be  full  of  feeling,  as  Augustin  was  then,  is 
not  only  to  feel  with  excessive  sensitiveness  the 
least  wounds,  the  slightest  touches  of  love  or  hate, 
nor  is  it  only  to  give  oneself  with  transport  ;  but 
it  is  especially  to  take  delight  in  the  gift  of  oneself, 
to  feel  at  the  moment  of  full  abandonment  that 
one  is  communicating  with  something  infinitely 
sweet,  which  already  has  ceased  to  be  the  creature 
loved.  It  is  love  for  love,  it  is  to  weep  for  the  plea- 
sure of  tears,  it  is  to  mix  with  tenderness  a  kind 
of  egoism  avid  of  experiences.  Having  lost  his  friend, 
Augustin  loathes  all  the  world.  He  repeats  : 
"  Tears  were  my  only  comfort.  I  was  wretched, 
and  my  wretchedness  was  dear  to  me."  And 
accordingly,  he  did  not  want  to  be  consoled.  But 
as,  little  by  little,  the  terrors  of  that  parting  sub- 
sided, he  perceived  himself  that  he  played  with 
grief  and  made  a  joy  of  his  tears.  "  My  tears," 
he  says,  "  were  dearer  to  me  than  my  friend  had 
been."  By  degrees  the  friend  is  almost  forgotten. 
Though  Augustin  may  hate  life  because  his  friend 
has  gone,  he  confesses  naively  that  he  would  not 
have  sacrificed  his  existence  for  the  sake  of  the 


120  SAINT   AUGUSTIN 

dead.  He  surmises  that  what  is  told  of  Orestes 
and  Pylades  contending  to  die  for  each  other  is  but 
a  fable.  Ultimately,  he  comes  to  write  :  "  Perhaps 
I  feared  to  die,  lest  the  other  half  of  him  whom  I  had 
loved  so  dearly,  should  perish."  He  himself,  in  his 
Retractations,  condemns  this  phrase  as  pure  rhetoric. 
It  remains  true  that  what  was  perhaps  the  deepest 
sorrow  of  his  life — this  sorrow  so  sincere  and  pain- 
ful which  had  "  rent  and  bloodied  his  soul  " — ended 
with  a  striking  phrase. 

It  should  be  added,  that  in  a  stormy  nature  like 
his,  grief,  like  love,  wears  itself  out  quickly.  It 
burns  up  passion  and  sentiment  as  it  does  ideas. 
When  at  length  he  regained  his  calm,  everything 
appeared  drab.  Thagaste  became  intolerable.  With 
his  impulsive  temperament,  his  changeable  humour, 
he  all  at  once  hit  upon  a  plan  :  To  go  back  to 
Carthage  and  open  a  rhetoric  school.  Perhaps,  too, 
the  woman  he  loved  and  had  abandoned  there  was 
pressing  him  to  return.  Perhaps  she  told  him  that 
she  was  about  to  become  a  mother.  Always  ready 
to  go  away,  Augustin  scarcely  hesitated.  It  is  more 
than  likely  that  he  did  not  consult  Monnica.  He 
only  told  Romanianus,  who,  as  he  had  all  kinds 
of  reasons  for  wanting  to  keep  Augustin  at  Thagaste, 
at  first  strongly  objected.  But  the  young  man 
pointed  to  his  future,  his  ambition  to  win  fame. 
Was  he  going  to  bury  all  that  in  a  little  town  ? 

Romanianus  yielded,  and  with  a  generosity  that 
is  no  longer  seen,  he  paid  the  expenses  this  time  too. 


V 

THE   SILENCE   OF   GOD 

AUGUSTIN  was  going  to  live  nine  years  at  Car- 
/jLthage — nine  years  that  he  squandered  in  obscure 
tasks,  in  disputes  sterile  or  unfortunate  for  himself 
and  others — briefly,  in  an  utter  forgetfulness  of  his 
true  vocation.  "  And  during  this  time  Thou  wert 
silent,  O  my  God  !  "  he  cries,  in  recalling  only  the 
faults  of  his  early  youth.  Now,  the  silence  of  God 
lay  heavy.  And  yet  even  in  those  years  his  tormented 
soul  had  not  ceased  to  appeal.  "  Where  wert  Thou 
then,  O  my  God,  while  I  looked  for  Thee  ?  Thou 
wert  before  me.  But  I  had  drawn  away  from 
myself,  and  I  could  not  find  myself.  How  much 
less,  then,  could  I  find  Thee." 

This  was  certainly  the  most  uneasy,  and,  at 
moments,  the  most  painful  time  of  his  life.  Hardly 
was  he  got  back  to  Carthage  than  he  had  to  struggle 
against  ever-increasing  money  difficulties.  Not 
only  had  he  to  get  his  own  living,  but  the  living  of 
others — possibly  his  mother's  and  that  of  his 
brother  and  sister — at  all  events,  he  had  to  support 
his  mistress  and  the  child.  It  is  possible  that  the 
infant  was  born  before  its  father  left  Thagaste ;  if 
not,  the  birth  must  have  occurred  shortly  after. 

The  child  was  called  Adeodatus.  There  is  a  kind 
of  irony  in  this  name,  which  was  then  usual,  of 
Adeodatus — "  Gift  of  God."    This  son  of  his  sin,  as 


122  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

Augustin  calls  him,  this  son  whom  he  did  not  want, 
and  the  news  of  whose  birth  must  have  been  a 
painful  shock — this  poor  child  was  a  gift  of  Heaven 
which  the  father  could  have  well  done  without. 
And  then,  when  he  saw  him,  he  was  filled  with  joy, 
and  he  cherished  him  as  a  real  gift  from  God. 

He  accepted  his  fatherhood  courageously,  and,  as 
it  happens  in  such  cases,  he  was  drawn  closer  to 
his  mistress,  their  association  taking  on  something 
of  conjugal  dignity.  Did  the  mother  of  Adeodatus 
justify  such  attachment — an  attachment  which  was 
to  last  more  than  ten  years  ?  The  mystery  in  which 
^  Augustin  intended  that  the  woman  he  had  loved 
the  most  should  remain  enveloped  for  all  time,  is 
nearly  impenetrable  to  us.  No  doubt  she  was  of  a 
very  humble,  not  to  say  low  class,  since  Monnica 
judged  it  impossible  to  bring  about  a  marriage 
between  the  ill-assorted  pair.  There  must  have  been 
an  extreme  inequality  between  the  birth  and  educa- 
tion of  the  lovers.  This  did  not  prevent  Augustin 
from  loving  his  mistress  passionately,  for  her  beauty 
perhaps,  or  perhaps  for  her  goodness  of  heart,  or 
both.  Nevertheless,  it  is  surprising,  that  in  view  of 
his  changing  humour,  and  his  prompt  and  impression- 
able soul,  he  remained  faithful  to  her  so  long.  What 
was  to  prevent  his  taking  his  son  and  going  off  ? 
Ancient  custom  authorized  such  an  act.  But  Augus- 
tin was  tender-hearted.  He  was  afraid  to  cause  pain  ; 
he  dreaded  for  others  the  wounds  that  caused  him 
so  much  suffering  himself.  So  he  stayed  on  from 
kindness,  from  pity,  habit  too,  and  also  because,  in 
spite  of  everything,  he  loved  the  mother  of  his  child. 
Up  to  the  time  of  his  conversion,  they  lived  like 
husband  and  wife. 


THE   SILENCE   OF   GOD  123 

So  now,  to  keep  his  family,  he  really  turns  **  a 
dealer  in  words."  In  spite  of  his  youth  (he  was 
barely  twenty)  the  terms  he  had  kept  at  Thagaste 
as  a  teacher  of  grammar  allowed  him  to  take  his 
place  among  the  rhetoricians  at  Carthage.  Thanks  to 
Romanianus,  he  got  pupils  at  once.  His  protector 
at  Thagaste  sent  his  son,  that  young  Licentius  whose 
education  Augustin  had  already  begun,  with  one  of 
his  brothers,  doubtless  younger.  It  seems  likely  that 
the  two  youths  lived  in  Augustin's  house.  A  small 
fact  which  their  master  has  preserved,  looks  like  a 
proof  of  this.  A  spoon  having  been  lost  in  the 
house,  Augustin,  to  find  out  where  it  was,  told 
Licentius  to  go  and  consult  a  wizard,  one  Albicerius, 
who  had,  just  then,  a  great  name  in  Carthage.  This 
message  is  scarcely  to  be  explained  unless  we  sup- 
pose the  lad  was  lodging  in  his  professor's  house. 
Another  of  the  pupils  is  known  to  us.  This  is 
Eulogius,  who  was  later  on  a  rhetorician  at  Carthage, 
and  of  whom  Augustin  relates  an  extraordinary 
dream.  Finally,  there  was  Alypius,  a  little  younger 
than  himself,  his  friend — "  the  brother  of  his  heart,'' 
as  he  calls  him.  Alypius  had  been  attending  his 
lessons  at  Thagaste.  When  the  schoolmaster 
abruptly  threw  up  his  employment,  the  father  of 
the  pupil  was  angry,  and  in  sending  his  son  to  Car- 
thage, he  forbade  him  to  go  near  Augustin's  class. 
But  it  was  difficult  to  keep  such  eager  friends  apart. 
Little  by  little,  Alypius  overcame  his  father's  objec- 
tions, and  became  a  pupil  of  his  friend. 

Augustin's  knowledge,  when  he  began  to  lecture, 
could  not  have  been  very  deep,  for  he  had  only 
lately  quitted  the  student's  bench  himself.  His 
duties  forced  him  to  learn  what  he  did  not  know. 


124  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

In  teaching  he  taught  himself.  It  was  at  this  time 
that  he  did  most  of  the  reading  which  afterwards 
added  substance  to  his  polemics  and  treatises.  He 
tells  us  himself  that  he  read  in  those  days  all  that 
he  could  lay  hands  on.  He  is  very  proud  of  having 
read  by  himself  and  understood  without  any  assist- 
ance from  a  master,  the  Ten  Categories  of  Aristotle, 
which  was  considered  one  of  the  most  abstruse 
works  of  the  Stagirite.  In  an  age  when  instruction 
was  principally  by  word  of  mouth,  and  books  com- 
parativel}^  rare,  it  is  obvious  that  Augustin  was  not 
what  we  call  an  "  all-devouring  reader."  We  do 
not  know  if  Carthage  had  many  libraries,  or  what 
the  libraries  were  worth.  It  is  no  less  true  that  the 
author  of  The  City  of  God  is  the  last  of  the  Latin 
writers  who  had  a  really  all-round  knowledge.  It 
is  he  who  is  the  link  between  modern  times  and 
pagan  antiquity.  The  Middle  Age  hardly  knew 
classical  literature,  save  by  the  allusions  and  quota- 
tions of  Augustin. 

So  in  spite  of  family  and  professional  cares,  he 
did  not  lose  his  intellectual  proclivities.  The  con- 
quest of  truth  remained  always  his  great  ambition. 
He  still  hoped  to  find  it  in  Manicheeism,  but  he  began 
to  think  that  it  was  a  long  time  coming.  The  leaders 
of  the  sect  could  not  have  trusted  him  thoroughly. 
They  feared  his  acute  and  subtle  mind,  so  quick 
to  detect  the  flaw  in  a  thesis  or  argument.  That  is 
why  they  postponed  his  initiation  into  their  secret 
doctrines.  Augustin  remained  a  simple  auditor  in 
their  Church.  By  way  of  appeasing  the  enormous 
activity  of  his  intelligence,  they  turned  him  on  to 
controversy,  and  the  critical  discussion  of  the  Scrip- 
tures.    Giving  themselves  out  for  Christians,  they 


THE   SILENCE   OF   GOD  125 

adopted  a  part  of  them,  and  flung  aside  as  inter- 
polated or  forged  all  that  was  not  in  tune  with  their 
theology.  Augustin,  as  we  know,  triumphed  in 
disputes  of  this  kind,  and  was  vain  because  he 
excelled  in  them. 

And  when  he  grew  tired  of  this  negative  criticism 
and  asked  his  evangelists  to  give  him  more  substan- 
tial food,  they  put  him  on  some  exoteric  doctrine 
calculated  to  appeal  to  a  young  imagination  by  its 
poetic  or  philosophical  colouring.  The  catechumen 
was  not  satisfied,  but  he  put  up  with  it  for  lack  of 
anything  better.  Very  prettily  he  compares  these 
enemies  of  the  Scriptures  to  the  snarers  of  birds,  who 
defile  or  fill  with  earth  all  the  water-places  where  the 
birds  use  to  drink,  save  one  mere ;  and  about  this 
they  set  their  snares.  The  birds  all  fly  there,  not 
because  the  water  is  better,  but  because  there  is  no 
other  water,  and  they  know  not  where  else  to  go  and 
drink.  So  Augustin,  not  knowing  where  to  quench 
his  thirst  for  truth,  was  fain  to  make  the  best  of  the 
confused  pantheism  of  the  Manichees. 

What  remains  noteworthy  is,  that  however  un- 
stable his  own  convictions  were,  he  yet  converted 
everybody  about  him.  It  was  through  him  that  his 
friends  became  Manichees  :  Alypius  one  of  the  first ; 
then  Nebridius,  the  son  of  a  great  landowner  near 
Carthage ;  Honoratius,  Marcianus ;  perhaps,  too, 
the  youngest  of  his  pupils,  Licentius  and  his 
brother — all  victims  of  his  persuasive  tongue,  which 
he  exerted  later  on  to  draw  them  back  from  their 
errors.  So  great  was  his  charm — so  deep,  especially, 
was  public  credulity  ! 

This  fourth  century  was  no  longer  a  century  of 
strong  Christian  faith.    On  the  other  hand,  the  last 


126  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

agony  of  paganism  was  marked  by  a  new  attack 
of  the  lowest  credulity  and  superstition.  As  the 
Church  energetically  combated  both  one  and  the 
other,  it  is  not  surprising  that  it  was  chiefly  the 
pagans  who  were  contaminated.  The  old  religion 
was  to  end  by  foundering  in  magic.  The  greatest 
minds  of  the  period,  the  neo-Platonists,  the  Emperor 
Julian  himself,  were  miracle-workers,  or  at  any 
rate,  adepts  in  the  occult  sciences.  Augustin,  who 
was  then  separated  from  Christianity,  followed  the 
general  impulse,  together  with  the  young  men  he 
knew.  Just  now  we  saw  him  sending  to  consult  the 
soothsayer,  Albicerius,  about  the  loss  of  a  spoon. 
And  this  man  of  intellect  believed  also  in  astrologers 
and  nigromancers. 

Strips  of  lead  have  been  found  at  Carthage 
upon  which  are  written  magic  spells  against  horses 
entered  for  races  in  the  circus.  Just  like  the 
Carthaginian  jockeys,  Augustin  had  recourse  to 
these  hidden  and  fraudulent  practices,  to  make  sure 
of  success.  On  the  eve  of  a  verse  competition  in 
the  theatre,  he  fell  in  with  a  wizard  who  offered,  if 
they  could  agree  about  the  price,  to  sacrifice  a 
certain  number  of  animals  to  buy  the  victory. 
Upon  this,  Augustin,  very  much  annoyed,  declared 
that  if  the  prize  were  a  crown  of  immortal  gold,  not 
a  fly  should  be  sacrificed  to  help  him  win  it.  Really, 
magic  was  repellent  to  the  honesty  of  his  mind,  as 
well  as  to  his  nerves,  by  reason  of  the  suspicious  and 
brutal  part  of  its  operations.  As  a  rule,  it  was 
involved  with  haruspicy,  and  had  a  side  of  sacred 
anatomy  and  the  kitchen  which  revolted  the  sensi- 
tive— dissection  of  flesh,  inspection  of  entrails,  not  to 
mention  the  slaughtering  and  strangling  of  victims. 


THE   SILENCE   OF   GOD  127 

Fanatics,  such  as  Julian,  gave  themselves  up  with 
delight  to  these  disgusting  manipulations.  What 
we  know  of  Augustin's  soul  makes  it  quite  clear  why 
he  recoiled  with  horror. 

Astrology,  on  the  contrary,  attracted  him  by  its 
apparent  science.  Its  adepts  called  themselves 
"  mathematicians,"  and  thus  seemed  to  borrow 
from  the  exact  sciences  something  of  their  solidity. 
Augustin  often  discussed  astrology  with  a  Carthage 
physician,  Vindicianus,  a  man  of  great  sense  and 
wide  learning,  who  even  reached  Proconsular 
honours.  In  vain  did  he  point  out  to  the  young 
rhetorician  that  the  pretended  prophecies  of  the 
mathematicians  were  the  effect  of  chance  ;  in  vain 
did  Nebridius,  less  credulous  than  his  friend,  join 
his  arguments  to  those  of  the  crafty  physician  ; 
Augustin  clung  obstinately  to  his  chimera.  His 
dialectical  mind  discovered  ingenious  justifications 
for  what  the  astrologers  claimed. 

Thus,  dazzled  by  all  the  intellectual  phantasms, 
he  strayed  from  one  science  to  another,  repeating 
meanwhile  in  his  heart  the  motto  of  his  Manichean 
masters  :  **  The  Truth,  the  Truth  !  "  But  whatever 
might  be  the  attractions  of  the  speculative  life,  he 
had  first  to  face  the  needs  of  actual  life.  The  sight 
of  his  child  called  him  back  to  a  sense  of  his  posi- 
tion. To  get  money,  and  for  that  purpose  to  push 
himself  forward,  put  himself  in  evidence,  increase 
his  reputation — Augustin  worked  at  that  as  hard 
as  he  could.  It  led  him  to  enter  for  the  prize  of 
dramatic  poetry.  He  was  declared  the  winner.  His 
old  friend,  the  physician  Vindicianus,  who  was  then 
Proconsul,  placed  the  crown,  as  he  says,  upon  his 
"  disordered  head."    The  future  Father  of  the  Church 


128  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

writing  for  the  theatre — and  what  a  theatre  it  was 
then ! — is  not  the  least  extraordinary  thing  in  this 
hfe  so  disturbed  and,  at  first  sight,  so  contradictory. 

It  was  also  from  literary  ambition  that  about  the 
same  time  he  wrote  a  book  on  aesthetics  called 
Upon  the  Beautiful  and  the  Fit,  which  he  dedicated 
to  a  famous  colleague,  the  Syrian  Hierius,  *'  orator 
to  the  City  of  Rome,"  one  of  the  professors  of  the 
official  education  appointed  either  by  the  Roman 
municipality  or  the  Imperial  treasury.  This  Levan- 
tine rhetorician  had  an  immense  success  in  the 
capital  of  the  Empire.  His  renown  had  got  beyond 
academical  and  fashionable  circles  and  crossed  the 
sea.  Augustin  admired  him  on  trust,  like  everybody 
else.  It  is  clear  that  at  this  time  he  could  not 
imagine  a  more  glorious  fortune  for  himself  than  to 
become,  like  Hierius,  orator  to  the  City  of  Rome. 
Later  in  life,  the  Bishop  of  Hippo,  while  condemning 
the  vanity  of  his  youthful  ambitions,  must  have 
made  some  extremely  ironical  reflections  as  to  their 
modesty.  How  mistaken  he  was  about  himself  ! 
An  Augustin  had  dreamed  of  equalling  one  day 
this  obscure  pedagogue,  of  whom  nobody,  save  for 
him,  would  ever  have  spoken  again.  Men  of  instinct, 
like  Augustin,  continually  go  wrong  in  this  way 
about  their  object  and  the  means  to  employ.  But 
their  mistakes  are  only  in  appearance.  A  will 
stronger  than  their  own  leads  them,  by  mysterious 
ways,  whither  they  ought  to  go. 

This  first  book  of  Augustin's  is  lost,  and  we  are 
unable  to  say  whether  there  be  any  reason  to  regret 
it.  He  himself  recalls  it  to  us  in  a  very  indifferent 
tone  and  rather  vague  terms.  It  would  seem, 
however,  that  his  aesthetic  had  a  basis  of  Manichean 


THE   SILENCE   OF  GOD  129 

metaphysics.  But  what  is  significant  for  us,  in  this 
youthful  essay,  is  that  the  first  time  Augustin  wrote 
as  an  author  it  was  to  define  and  to  praise  Beauty. 
He  did  not  yet  know,  at  least  not  directly  from  the 
text,  the  dialogues  of  Plato,  and  he  is  already  in- 
clined to  Platonism.  He  was  this  by  nature.  His 
Christianity  will  be  a  religion  all  of  light  and  beauty. 
For  him,  the  supreme  Beaut}''  is  identical  with  the 
supreme  Love.  "  Do  we  love  anything,"  he  used  to 
say  to  his  friends,  "except  what  is  beautiful?" 
Num  amamus  aliquid,  nisi  pulchrum  P  Again,  at 
the  end  of  his  life,  when  he  strives  in  The  City  of  God 
to  make  clear  for  us  the  dogma  of  the  resurrection 
of  the  body,  he  thinks  our  bodies  shall  rise  free  from 
all  earthly  flaws,  in  all  the  splendour  of  the  perfect 
human  type.  Nothing  of  the  body  will  be  lost.  It 
will  keep  all  its  limbs  and  all  its  organs  because  they 
are  beautiful.  One  recognizes  in  this  passage,  not 
only  the  Platonist,  but  the  traveller  and  art-lover, 
who  had  gazed  upon  some  of  the  finest  specimens  of 
ancient  statuary. 

This  first  book  had  hardly  any  success.  Augustin 
does  not  even  say  whether  the  celebrated  Hierius 
paid  him  a  compliment  about  it,  and  he  has  an  air 
of  giving  us  to  understand  that  he  had  no  other 
admirer  but  himself.  New  disappointments,  more 
serious  mortifications,  changed  little  by  little  his 
state  of  mind  and  his  plans  for  the  future.  He  was 
obliged  to  acknowledge  that  after  years  of  effort 
he  was  scarcely  more  advanced  than  at  the  start. 
There  was  no  chance  to  delude  himself  with  vain 
pretences  :  it  was  quite  plain  to  everybody  that  the 
rhetorician  Augustin  was  not  a  success.  Now,  why 
was  this  ?    Was  it  that  he  lacked  the  gift  of  teach- 


130  SAINT   AUGUSTIN 

ing  ?  Perhaps  he  had  not  the  knack  of  keeping 
order,  which  is  the  most  indispensable  of  all  for  a 
schoolmaster.  What  suited  him  best  no  doubt  was 
a  small  and  select  audience  which  he  charmed  rather 
than  ruled.  Large  and  noisy  classes  he  could  not 
manage.  At  Carthage,  these  rhetoric  classes  were 
particularly  difficult  to  keep  in  order,  because  the 
students  were  more  rowdy  than  elsewhere.  At  any 
moment  "  The  Wreckers  "  might  burst  in  and  make 
a  row.  Augustin,  who  had  not  joined  in  these  "  rags  " 
when  he  was  a  student,  saw  himself  obliged  to 
endure  them  as  a  professor.  He  had  nothing  worse 
to  complain  of  than  his  fellow-professors,  in  whose 
classes  the  same  kind  of  disturbance  took  place.  That 
was  the  custom  and,  in  a  manner  of  speaking,  the  rule 
in  the  Carthage  schools.  For  all  that,  a  little  more 
authoritative  bearing  would  not  have  harmed  him 
in  the  eyes  of  these  disorderly  boys.  But  he  had 
still  graver  defects  for  a  professor  who  wants  to  get 
on  :  he  was  not  a  schemer,  and  he  could  not  make 
the  most  of  himself. 

It  is  quite  possible  that  he  did  not  possess  the 
qualities  which  just  then  pleased  the  pagan  public 
in  a  rhetorician.  The  importance  that  the  ancients 
attached  to  physical  advantages  in  an  orator  is 
well  known.  Now,  according  to  an  old  tradition, 
Augustin  was  a  little  man  and  not  strong  :  till  the 
end  of  his  life  he  complained  of  his  health.  He  had 
a  weak  voice,  a  delicate  chest,  and  was  often  hoarse. 
Surely  this  injured  him  before  audiences  used  to  all 
the  outward  emphasis  and  all  the  studied  graces  of 
Roman  eloquence.  Finally,  his  written  and  spoken 
language  had  none  of  those  brilliant  and  ingenious 
curiosities  of  phrase  which  pleased  in  literary  and 


1 


i 


THE   SILENCE   OF  GOD  131 

fashionable  circles.  This  inexhaustibly  prolific 
writer  is  not  in  the  least  a  stylist.  In  this  respect  he 
is  inferior  to  Apuleius,  or  Tertullian,  though  he 
leaves  them  far  behind  in  the  qualities  of  sincere 
and  deep  sentiment,  poetic  flow,  colour,  the  vivid- 
ness of  metaphor,  and,  besides,  the  emotion,  the 
suavity  of  the  tone.  With  all  that,  no  matter  how 
hard  he  tried,  he  could  never  grasp  what  the  rheto- 
ricians of  his  time  understood  by  style.  This  is  why 
his  writings,  as  well  as  his  addresses,  were  not  very 
much  liked. 

Nevertheless,  good  judges  recognized  his  value, 
and  guessed  the  powers,  lying  still  unformed  within 
him,  which  he  was  misusing  ere  they  were  mature. 
He  was  received  at  the  house  of  the  Proconsul 
Vindicianus,  who  liked  to  talk  with  him,  and 
treated  him  with  quite  fatherly  kindness.  Augustin 
knew  people  in  the  best  society.  He  did  all  his  life. 
His  charm  and  captivating  manners  made  him 
welcome  in  the  most  exclusive  circles.  But  just 
because  he  was  valued  by  fashionable  society,  it  came 
home  to  him  more  painfully  that  he  had  not  the 
position  he  deserved  with  the  public  at  large.  Little 
by  little  his  humour  grew  bitter.  In  this  angry 
state  of  mind  he  was  no  longer  able  to  consider 
things  with  the  same  confidence  and  serenity.  His 
mental  disquietudes  took  hold  of  him  again. 

His  ideas  were  affected,  first  of  all.  He  began  to 
have  doubts,  more  and  more  definite,  about  Mani- 
cheeism.  He  began  by  suspecting  the  rather 
theatrical  austerity  which  the  initiated  of  the  sect 
made  such  a  great  parade  of.  Among  other  turpi- 
tudes, he  saw  one  day  in  one  of  the  busiest  parts  of 
Carthage  "  three  of  the   Elect   whinny  after  some 


132  SAINT   AUGUSTIN 

women  or  other  who  were  passing,  and  begin 
making  such  obscene  signs  that  they  surpassed  the 
coarsest  people  for  impudence  and  shamelessness." 
He  was  scandahzed  at  that ;  but,  after  all,  it  was  a 
small  thing.  He  himself  was  not  so  very  virtuous 
then.  Generally  your  intellectual  worries  very 
little  about  squaring  his  conduct  with  his  principles, 
and  does  not  bother  about  the  practical  part. 
No  ;  what  was  much  worse  in  his  eyes  is  that  the 
Manichean  physical  science,  a  congeries  of  fables 
more  or  less  symbolical,  suddenly  struck  him  as 
ruinous.  He  had  just  been  studying  astronomy, 
and  he  found  that  the  cosmology  of  the  Manichees — 
of  these  men  who  called  themselves  materialists 
— did  not  agree  with  scientific  facts.  Therefore 
Manicheeism  must  be  wrong  universally,  since  it 
ran  counter  to  reason  confirmed  by  experience. 

Augustin  spoke  about  his  doubts,  not  only  to  his 
friends,  but  to  the  priests  of  his  sect.  These  got 
out  of  the  difficulty  by  evasions  and  the  most 
dazzling  promises.  A  Manichee  bishop,  a  certain 
Faustus,  was  coming  to  Carthage.  He  was  a  man 
of  immense  learning.  Most  certainly  he  would 
refute  every  objection  without  the  least  trouble. 
He  would  confirm  the  young  auditors  in  their 
faith.  ...  So  Augustin  and  his  friends  waited  for 
Faustus  as  for  a  Messiah.  Their  disappointment 
was  immense.  The  supposed  doctor  turned  out  to 
be  an  ignorant  man,  who  possessed  no  tincture  of 
science  or  philosophy,  and  whose  intellectual  baggage 
consisted  of  nothing  but  a  little  grammar.  A  delight- 
ful talker  and  a  wit,  the  most  he  could  do  was  to 
discourse  pleasantly  on  literature. 

This  disappointment,  joined  to  the  set-backs  in 


THE  SILENCE   OF   GOD  133 

his  profession,  brought  about  a  crisis  of  soul  and 
conscience  in  Augustin.  So  this  Truth  which  he  had 
sighed  after  so  long,  which  had  been  so  much 
promised  to  him,  was  onty  a  decoy  !  One  must  be 
content  not  to  know  !  .  .  .  Then  what  was  left 
to  do  since  truth  was  unapproachable  ?  Possibly 
fortune  and  honours  would  console  him  for  it. 
But  he  was  far  enough  from  them  too.  He  felt 
that  he  was  on  the  wrong  road,  that  he  was  getting 
into  a  rut  at  Carthage,  as  he  had  got  into  a  rut  at 
Thagaste.  He  must  succeed,  whatever  the  cost  ! 
.  .  .  And  then  he  gave  way  to  one  of  those  moments 
of  weariness,  when  a  man  has  no  further  hope  of 
saving  himself  save  by  some  desperate  step.  He 
was  sick  of  where  he  was  and  of  those  about  him. 
His  friends,  whom  he  knew  too  well,  had  nothing 
more  to  teach  him,  and  could  not  help  him  in  the 
only  search  which  passionately  interested  him. 
And  his  entanglement  became  irksome.  Here  was 
nine  years  that  this  sharing  of  bed  and  board 
had  lasted.  His  son  was  at  that  unattractive  age 
which  rather  bores  a  young  father  than  it  revives  an 
affection  already  old.  No  doubt  he  did  not  want  to 
abandon  him.  He  did  not  intend  to  break  altogether 
with  his  mistress.  But  he  felt  the  need  of  a  change 
of  air,  to  take  himself  off  somewhere  else,  where 
he  could  breathe  more  freely  and  get  fresh  courage 
for  his  task. 

Then  it  dawned  on  him  to  try  his  fortune  at 
Rome.  It  was  there  that  literary  reputations  were 
made.  He  would  find  there,  no  doubt,  better 
judges  than  at  Carthage.  He  would  very  likely 
end  by  getting  a  post  in  the  public  instruction, 
with  a  steady  salary — this  would  relieve  him  of 


134  SAINT   AUGUSTIN 

present  worries,  at  all  events.  Probably  he  had 
already  this  plan  in  his  head  when  he  sent  his 
treatise  On  the  Beautiful  to  Hierius,  orator  to  the 
City  of  Rome  ;  he  thought  that  by  this  polite- 
ness he  might  depend,  later,  on  the  backing  of  the 
well-known  rhetorician.  Lastly,  his  friends,  Hono- 
ratius,  Marcianus,  and  the  others,  earnestly  per- 
suaded him  to  go  and  find  a  stage  worthy  of  him 
at  Rome.  Alypius,  who  was  at  this  time  finishing 
his  law  studies  there,  and  must  have  felt  their 
separation,  pressed  him  to  come  to  Rome  and 
promised  him  success. 

Once  more,  Augustin  was  read}^  to  go  away.  He 
was  not  long  in  making  up  his  mind.  He  was  going 
to  leave  all  belonging  to  him,  his  mistress,  his  child, 
till  the  time  when  his  new  position  would  enable  him 
to  send  for  them.  He  himself  tells  us  that  the  chief 
motive  which  led  him  to  decide  on  this  journey  was 
that  the  Roman  students  were  said  to  be  better 
disciplined  and  less  noisy  than  the  students  at 
Carthage.  Evidently,  that  is  a  reason  which  would 
weigh  with  a  professor  who  objected  to  act  the 
policeman  in  his  class.  But  besides  the  reasons  we 
have  given,  there  were  others  which  must  have 
influenced  his  decision.  Theodosius  had  lately 
ordered  very  heavy  penalties  against  the  Manichees. 
Not  only  did  he  condemn  them  to  death,  but  he 
had  instituted  a  perfect  Inquisition,  with  the  special 
duty  of  spying  upon  and  prosecuting  these  heretics. 
Did  it  occur  to  Augustin  that  he  might  hide  better 
in  Rome,  where  he  was  unknown,  than  in  a  city 
where  he  was  a  marked  man  on  account  of  his 
proselytizing  zeal  ?  In  any  case,  his  departure  gave 
rise  to  calumnies  which  his  adversaries,  the  Donatists, 


THE  SILENCE   OF  GOD  135 

did  not  fail  many  years  later  to  bring  up  again  and 
make  worse.  They  accused  him  of  having  run 
away  from  prosecution  ;  he  fled  the  country,  so  they 
said,  on  account  of  a  judgment  which  was  out 
against  him,  pronounced  by  the  Proconsul  Mes- 
sianus.  Augustin  had  no  trouble  in  refuting  these 
false  insinuations.  But  all  these  facts  seem  to 
prove  that  the  most  ordinary  prudence  warned  him 
to  cross  the  sea  as  soon  as  possible. 

Accordingly,  he  prepared  to  set  sail.  Let  us  hope 
that  in  spite  of  his  lofty  indifference  to  material 
things,  he  made  some  provision  for  the  existence 
of  the  woman  and  child  he  left  behind.  As  for  her, 
she  appeared  to  agree  without  over-many  violent 
scenes  to  this  parting,  which,  he  said,  was  tem- 
porary. It  was  not  the  same  with  his  mother.  The 
very  idea  of  Rome,  which  seemed  to  her  another 
Babylon,  terrified  this  austere  African  woman. 
What  spiritual  dangers  lay  in  wait  for  her  son  there  ! 
She  wanted  to  keep  him  near  her,  both  to  bring 
him  to  the  faith  and  also  to  love  him — this  Augustin 
who  had  been  her  only  human  love.  And  then  he 
was  doubtless  the  chief  support  of  the  widow. 
Without  him,  what  was  going  to  become  of  her  ? 

The  fugitive  was  forced  to  put  a  trick  on  Monnica 
so  as  to  carry  out  his  plan.  She  would  not  leave 
him  a  moment,  folded  him  in  her  arms,  implored 
him  with  tears  not  to  go.  The  night  he  was  to  sail 
she  followed  him  down  to  the  dock,  although 
Augustin,  to  allay  her  suspicions,  had  told  her  a  lie. 
He  pretended  that  he  was  only  going  down  to  the 
ship  with  a  friend  to  see  him  off.  But  Monnica,  only 
half  believing,  followed.  Night  fell.  Meanwhile, 
the  ship,  anchored  in  a  little  bay  to  the  north  of  the 


136  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

city,  did  not  move.  The  sailors  were  waiting  till 
a  wind  rose  to  slip  their  moorings.  The  weather 
was  moist  and  oppressive,  as  it  usually  is  in  the 
Mediterranean  in  August  and  September.  There 
was  not  a  breath  of  air.  The  hours  passed  on. 
Monnica,  overcome  by  heat  and  fatigue,  could 
hardly  stand.  Then  Augustin  cunningly  persuaded 
her  to  go  and  pass  the  night  in  a  chapel  hard  by, 
since  it  was  plain  that  the  ship  would  not  weigh 
anchor  till  dawn.  After  many  remonstrances,  she 
at  length  agreed  to  rest  in  this  chapel — a  memoria 
consecrated  to  St.  Cyprian,  the  great  martyr  and 
patron  of  Carthage. 

Like  most  of  the  African  sanctuaries  of  those 
days,  and  the  marabouts  of  to-day,  this  one  must 
have  been  either  surrounded,  or  approached,  by 
a  court  with  a  portico  in  arcades,  where  it  was 
possible  to  sleep.  Monnica  sat  down  on  the  ground 
under  her  heap  of  veils  among  other  poor  people 
and  travellers,  who  were  come  like  her  to  try  to 
find  a  little  cool  air  on  this  stifling  night  near  the 
relics  of  the  blessed  Cyprian.  She  prayed  for  her 
child,  offering  to  God  "  the  blood  of  her  heart," 
begging  God  not  to  let  him  go,  "  for  she  loved  to 
keep  me  with  her,"  says  Augustin,  "  as  mothers 
are  wont,  yes,  far  more  than  most  mothers."  And 
like  a  true  daughter  of  Eve,  "  weeping  and  crying, 
she  sought  again  with  groans  the  son  she  had 
brought  forth  with  groans."  She  prayed  for  a  long 
time ;  then,  worn  out  with  sorrow,  she  slept.  The 
porter  of  the  chapel,  without  knowing  it,  watched 
that  night  not  only  the  mother  of  the  rhetorician 
Augustin,  but  the  ancestor  of  an  innumerable  line 
of  souls  ;    this  humble  woman,  who  slept  there  on 


THE  SILENCE   OF  GOD  137 

the  ground,  on  the  flags  of  the  courtyard,  carried  in 
her  heart  all  the  yearning  of  all  the  mothers  of  the 
future. 

While  she  slept,  Augustin  went  stealthily  on 
board.  The  silence  and  the  tempered  splendour  of 
the  night  weighed  him  down.  Sometimes  the  cry 
of  the  sailors  on  watch  took  a  strange  note  in  the 
lustrous  vaporous  spaces.  The  Gulf  of  Carthage 
gleam.ed  far  off  under  the  scintillation  of  the  stars, 
under  the  palpitating  of  a  milky  way  all  white  like 
the  flowers  of  the  garden  of  Heaven.  But  Augustin's 
heart  was  heavy,  heavier  than  the  air  weighted  by 
the  heat  and  sea-damp — heavy  from  the  lie  and  the 
cruelty  he  had  just  committed.  He  saw  already 
the  awakening  and  sorrow  of  his  mother.  His  con- 
science was  troubled,  overcome  by  remorse  and  fore- 
bodings. .  .  .  Meanwhile,  his  friends  tried  to  cheer 
him,  and  urged  him  to  have  courage  and  hope. 
Marcianus,  while  embracing  him,  reminded  him  of 
the  verses  of  Terence  : 

"  This  day  which  brings  to  thee  another  life 
Demands  that  thou  another  man  shalt  be." 

Augustin  smiled  sadly.  At  last  the  ship  began  to 
move.  The  wind  had  risen,  the  wind  of  the  grand 
voyage  which  was  bearing  him  to  the  unknown. 
.  .  .  Suddenly,  at  the  keen  freshness  of  the  open 
sea,  he  thrilled.  His  strength  and  confidence 
rushed  back.  To  go  away  !  What  enchantment  for 
all  those  who  cannot  fasten  themselves  to  a  corner 
of  the  earth,  who  know  by  instinct  that  they  belong 
elsewhere,  who  always  pass  "  as  strangers  and  as 
pilgrims,"  and  who  go  away  with  relief,  as  if  they 
cast  a  burthen  behind  them.  Augustin  was  of  those 
people — of  those  who,  among  the  fairest  attractions 


138  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

of  the  Road,  never  cease  to  think  of  the  Return. 
But  he  knew  not  where  God  was  leading  him. 
Marcianus  was  right  :  a  new  hfe  was  really  be- 
ginning for  him  ;  only  it  was  not  the  life  that  either 
of  them  hoped  for. 

He  who  departed  as  a  rhetorician,  to  sell  words, 
was  to  come  back  as  an  apostle,  to  conquer  souls. 


THE    THIRD    PART 
THE    RETURN 


Et  ecce  ibi  es  in  corde  eorum,  in  corde  confitentium 
tibi,  et  projicientium  se  in  te,  et  plorantium  in  sinu  tuo, 
post  vias  suas  difficiles. 

"And  behold!  Thou  art  there  in  their  hearts,  in  the 
hearts  of  them  that  confess  to  Thee,  and  cast  themselves 
upon  Thee,  and  sob  upon  Thy  breast,  after  their  weary 
ways."  Confessions^  V,  2. 


THE   CITY    OF   GOLD 

AUGUSTIN  fell  ill  just  after  he  got  to  Rome. 
L  It  would  seem  that  he  arrived  there  towards 
the  end  of  August  or  beginning  of  September,  before 
the  students  reassembled,  just  at  the  time  of  heat 
and  fevers,  when  all  Romans  who  could  leave  the 
city  fled  to  the  summer  resorts  on  the  coast. 

Like  all  the  great  cosmopolitan  centres  at  that 
time,  Rome  was  unhealthy.  The  diseases  of  the 
whole  earth,  brought  by  the  continual  inflow  of 
foreigners,  flourished  there.  Accordingly,  the  in- 
habitants had  a  panic  fear  of  infection,  like  our 
own  contemporaries.  People  withdrew  prudently 
from  those  suffering  from  infectious  disorders,  who 
were  left  to  their  unhappy  fate.  If,  from  a  sense 
of  shame,  they  sent  a  slave  to  the  patient's  bedside, 
he  was  ordered  to  the  sweating-rooms,  and  there 
disinfected  from  head  to  foot,  before  he  could  enter 
the  house  again. 

Augustin  must  have  had  at  least  the  good  luck 
to  be  well  looked  after,  since  he  recovered.  He  had 
gone  to  the  dwelling  of  one  of  his  Manichee  brethren, 
an  auditor  like  himself,  and  an  excellent  kind  of 
man,  whom  he  stayed  with  all  the  time  he  was 
in  Rome.  Still,  he  had  such  a  bad  attack  of  fever 
that  he  very  nearly  died.  '*  I  was  perishing,"  he 
says  ;    "  and  I  was  all  but  lost."     He  is  frightened 

141 


142  SAINT   AUGUSTIN 

at  the  idea  of  having  seen  death  so  near,  at  a  mo- 
ment when  he  was  so  far  from  God — so  far,  in  fact, 
that  it  never  occurred  to  him  to  ask  for  baptism, 
as  he  had  done,  in  hke  case,  when  he  was  Httle. 
Wrhat  a  desperate  blow  would  that  have  been  for 
Monnica  !  He  still  shudders  when  he  recalls  the 
danger  :  "  Had  my  mother's  heart  been  smitten 
with  that  wound,  it  never  could  have  been  healed. 
For  I  cannot  express  her  tender  love  towards  me,  or 
with  how  far  greater  anguish  she  travailed  of  me 
now  in  the  spirit,  than  when  she  bore  me  in  the  flesh." 
But  Monnica  prayed.  Augustin  was  saved.  He  ascribes 
his  recovery  to  the  fervent  prayers  of  his  mother,  who, 
in  begging  of  God  the  welfare  of  his  soul,  obtained, 
without  knowing  it,  the  welfare  of  his  body. 

As  soon  as  he  was  convalescent,  he  had  to  set 
to  work  to  get  pupils.  He  was  obliged  to  ask 
the  favours  of  many  an  important  personage,  to 
knock  at  many  an  inhospitable  door.  This  unfortu- 
nate beginning,  the  almost  mortal  illness  which 
he  was  only  just  recovering  from,  this  forced 
drudgery — all  that  did  not  make  him  very  fond  of 
Rome.  It  seems  quite  plain  that  he  never  liked  it, 
and  till  the  end  of  his  life  he  kept  a  grudge  against 
it  for  the  sorry  reception  it  gave  him.  In  the  whole 
body  of  his  writings  it  is  impossible  to  find  a  word 
of  praise  for  the  beauty  of  the  Eternal  City,  while, 
on  the  contrary,  one  can  make  out  through  his 
invectives  against  the  vices  of  Carthage,  his  secret 
partiality  for  the  African  Rome,  The  old  rivalry 
between  the  two  cities  was  not  yet  dead  after  so 
many  centuries.  In  his  heart,  Augustin,  like  a 
good  Carthaginian — and  because  he  was  a  Cartha- 
ginian— did  not  like  Rome. 


THE   CITY   OF  GOLD  143 

The  most  annoying  things  joined  together  as  if 
on  purpose  to  disgust  him  with  it.  The  bad  season 
of  the  year  was  nigh  when  he  began  to  reside  there. 
Autumn  rains  had  started,  and  the  mornings  and 
evenings  were  cold.  What  with  his  dehcate  chest, 
and  his  African  constitution  sensitive  to  cold,  he 
must  have  suffered  from  this  damp  cold  climate. 
Rome  seemed  to  him  a  northern  city.  With  his 
eyes  still  full  of  the  warm  light  of  his  country,  and 
the  joyous  whiteness  of  the  Carthage  streets,  he 
wandered  as  one  exiled  between  the  gloomy  Roman 
palaces,  saddened  by  the  grey  walls  and  muddy 
pavements.  Comparisons,  involuntary  and  con- 
tinual, between  Carthage  and  Rome,  made  him  un- 
just to  Rome.  In  his  eyes  it  had  a  hard,  self- 
conscious,  declamatory  look,  and  gazing  at  the 
barren  Roman  campagna,  he  remembered  the  laugh- 
ing Carthage  suburbs,  with  gardens,  villas,  vine- 
yards, olivets,  circled  everywhere  by  the  brilliance 
of  the  sea  and  the  lagoons. 

And  then,  besides,  Rome  could  not  be  a  very 
delightful  place  to  live  in  for  a  poor  rhetoric  master 
come  there  to  better  his  fortune.  Other  strangers 
before  him  had  complained  of  it.  Always  to  be 
going  up  and  down  the  flights  of  steps  and  the 
ascents,  often  very  steep,  of  the  city  of  the  Seven 
Hills  ;  to  be  rushing  between  the  Aventine  and 
Sallust's  garden,  and  thence  to  the  Esquihne  and 
Janiculum  !  To  bruise  the  feet  on  the  pointed 
cobbles  of  sloping  alley-ways  !  These  walks  were 
exhausting,  and  there  seemed  to  be  no  end  to  this 
city.  Carthage  was  also  large — as  large  almost  as 
Rome.  But  there  Augustin  was  not  seeking  em- 
ployment.    When  he  went  for  a  walk  there,   he 


144  SAINT   AUGUSTIN 

strolled.  Here,  the  bustle  of  the  crowds,  and  the 
number  of  equipages,  disturbed  and  exasperated  the 
southerner  with  his  lounging  habits.  Any  moment 
there  was  a  risk  of  being  run  over  by  cars  tearing 
at  full  gallop  through  the  narrow  streets  :  men  of 
fashion  just  then  had  a  craze  for  driving  fast.  Or 
again,  the  passenger  was  obliged  to  step  aside  so 
that  some  lady  might  go  by  in  her  litter,  escorted 
by  her  household,  from  the  handicraft  slaves  and 
the  kitchen  staff,  to  the  eunuchs  and  house-servants 
— all  this  arm}'  manoeuvring  under  the  orders  of  a 
leader  who  held  a  rod  in  his  hand,  the  sign  of  his 
office.  When  the  street  became  clear  once  more, 
and  at  last  the  palace  of  the  influential  personage 
to  whom  a  visit  had  to  be  paid  was  reached,  there 
was  no  admittance  without  greasing  the  knocker. 
In  order  to  be  presented  to  the  master,  it  was  neces- 
sary to  buy  the  good  graces  of  the  slave  who  took 
the  name  (nomenclator) ,  and  who  not  only  intro- 
duced the  suppliant,  but  might,  with  a  word, 
recommend  or  injure.  Even  after  all  these  precau- 
tions, one  was  not  yet  sure  of  the  goodwill  of  the 
patron.  Some  of  these  great  lords,  who  were  not 
always  themselves  sprung  from  old  Roman  families, 
prided  themselves  upon  their  uncompromising 
nationalism,  and  made  a  point  of  treating  foreigners 
with  considerable  haughtiness.  The  Africans  were 
regarded  unfavourably  in  Rome,  especially  in  Catholic 
circles.  Augustin  must  have  had  an  unpleasant  ex- 
perience of  this. 

Through  the  long  streets,  brilliantly  lighted  at 
evening  (it  would  seem  that  the  artificial  lighting 
of  Rome  almost  equalled  the  daylight),  he  would 
return  tired  out  to  the  dwelling  of  his  host,  the 


THE   CITY   OF  GOLD  145 

Manichee.  This  dwelling,  according  to  an  old 
tradition,  was  in  the  Velabrum  district,  in  a  street 
which  is  still  to-day  called  Via  Greca,  and  skirts 
the  very  old  church  of  Santa  Maria-in-Cosmedina — 
a  poor  quarter  where  swarmed  a  filthy  mass  of 
Orientals,  and  where  the  immigrants  from  the 
Levantine  countries,  Greeks,  Syrians,  Armenians, 
Egyptians,  lodged.  The  warehouses  on  the  Tiber 
were  not  very  far  off,  and  no  doubt  there  were 
numbers  of  labourers,  porters,  and  watermen  living 
in  this  neighbourhood.  What  a  place  for  him  who 
had  been  at  Thagaste  the  guest  of  the  magnificent 
Romanianus,  and  intimate  with  the  Proconsul  at 
Carthage  !  When  he  had  climbed  up  the  six  flights 
of  stairs  to  his  lodging,  and  crouched  shivering  over 
the  ill-burning  movable  hearth,  in  the  parsimonious 
light  of  a  small  bronze  or  earthenware  lamp,  while  the 
raw  damp  sweated  through  the  walls,  he  felt  more 
and  more  his  poverty  and  loneliness.  He  hated  Rome 
and  the  stupid  ambition  which  had  brought  him  there. 
And  yet  Rome  should  have  made  a  vivid  appeal 
to  this  cultured  man,  this  aesthete  so  alive  to  beauty. 
Although  the  transfer  of  the  Court  to  Milan  had 
drawn  away  some  of  its  liveliness  and  glitter,  it 
was  still  all  illuminated  by  its  grand  memories, 
and  never  had  it  been  more  beautiful.  It  seems 
impossible  that  Augustin  should  not  have  been 
struck  by  it,  despite  his  African  prejudices.  How- 
ever well  built  the  new  Carthage  might  be,  it  could 
not  pretend  to  compare  with  a  city  more  than  a 
thousand  years  old,  which  at  all  periods  of  its  his- 
tory had  maintained  the  princely  taste  for  building, 
and  which  a  long  line  of  emperors  had  never  ceased 
to  embellish. 


146  SAINT   AUGUSTIN 

When  Augustin  landed  at  Ostia,  he  saw  rise  before 
him,  closing  the  perspective  of  the  Via  Appia,  the 
Septizonium  of  Septimus  Severus — an  imitation, 
doubtless,  on  a  far  larger  scale,  of  the  one  at  Car- 
thage. This  huge  construction,  water-works  prob- 
ably of  enormous  size,  with  its  ordered  columns 
placed  line  above  line,  was,  so  to  speak,  the  portico 
whence  opened  the  most  wonderful  and  colossal 
architectural  mass  known  to  the  ancient  world. 
Modern  Rome  has  nothing  at  all  to  shew  which  comes 
anywhere  near  it.  Dominating  the  Roman  Forum, 
and  the  Fora  of  various  Emperors — labyrinths  of 
temples,  basilicas,  porticoes,  and  libraries — the  Capi- 
tol and  the  Palatine  rose  up  like  two  stone  moun- 
tains, fashioned  and  sculptured,  under  the  heap 
of  their  palaces  and  sanctuaries.  All  these  blocks 
rooted  in  the  soil,  suspended,  and  towering  up  from 
the  flanks  of  the  hills,  these  interminable  regiments 
of  columns  and  pilasters,  this  profusion  of  precious 
marbles,  metals,  mosaics,  statues,  obelisks — in  all 
that  there  was  something  enormous,  a  lack  of 
restraint  which  disturbed  the  taste  and  floored  the 
imagination.  But  it  was,  above  all,  the  excessive 
use  of  gold  and  gilding  that  astonished  the  visitor. 
Originally  indigent,  Rome  became  noted  for  its 
greed  of  gold.  When  the  gold  of  conquered  nations 
began  to  come  into  its  hands,  it  spread  it  all  over 
with  the  rather  indiscreet  display  of  the  upstart. 
When  Nero  built  the  Golden  House  he  realized  its 
dream.  The  Capitol  had  golden  doors.  Statues, 
bronzes,  the  roofs  of  temples,  were  all  gilded.  All 
this  gold,  spread  over  the  brilliant  surfaces  and  angles 
of  the  architecture,  dazzled  and  tired  the  eyes  : 
Acies  stupet  igne  metalli,  said  Claudian.     For  the 


THE   CITY   OF  GOLD  147 

poets  who  have  celebrated  it,  Rome  is  the  city  of 
gold — aurata  Roma. 

A  Greek,  such  as  Lucian,  had  perhaps  a  right  to 
be  shocked  by  this  architectural  debauch,  this 
beauty  too  crushing  and  too  rich.  A  Carthage 
rhetorician,  like  Augustin,  could  feel  at  the  sight  of 
it  nothing  but  the  same  irritated  admiration  and 
secret  jealousy  as  the  Emperor  Constans  felt  when 
he  visited  his  capital  for  the  first  time. 

Even  as  the  Byzantine  Caesar,  and  all  the  pro- 
vincials, Augustin,  no  doubt,  examined  the  curiosi- 
ties and  celebrated  works  which  were  pointed  out 
to  strangers  :  the  temple  of  Jupiter  Capitolinus  ; 
the  baths  of  Caracalla  and  Diocletian  ;  the  Pan- 
theon ;  the  temple  of  Roma  and  of  Venus  ;  the 
Place  of  Concord  ;  the  theatre  of  Pompey  ;  the 
Odeum,  and  the  Stadium.  Though  he  might  be 
stupefied  by  all  this,  he  would  remember,  too, 
all  that  the  Republic  had  taken  from  the  pro- 
vinces to  construct  these  wonders,  and  would 
say  to  himself :  "  'Tis  we  who  have  paid  for 
them."  In  truth,  all  the  world  had  been  ran- 
sacked to  make  Rome  beautiful.  For  some  time  a 
muffled  hostility  had  been  brewing  in  provincial 
hearts  against  the  tyranny  of  the  central  power, 
especially  since  it  had  shewn  itself  incapable  of 
maintaining  peace,  and  the  Barbarians  were  threat- 
ening the  frontiers.  Worn  out  by  so  many  in- 
surrections, wars,  massacres,  and  pillages,  the  pro- 
vinces had  come  to  ask  if  the  great  complicated 
machine  of  the  Empire  was  worth  all  the  blood  and 
money  that  it  cost. 

For  Augustin,  moreover,  the  crisis  was  drawing 
near  which  was  to  end  in  his  return  to  the  Catholic 


148  SAINT   AUGUSTIN 

faith.  He  had  been  a  Christian,  and  as  such  brought 
up  in  principles  of  humihty.  With  these  senti- 
ments, he  would  perhaps  decide  that  the  pride  and 
vanity  of  the  creature  at  Rome  claimed  far  too  much 
attention,  and  was  even  sacrilegious.  It  was  not 
only  the  emperors  who  disputed  the  privileges  of 
immortality  with  the  gods,  but  anybody  who  took 
it  into  his  head,  provided  that  he  was  rich  or  had 
any  kind  of  notoriety.  Amid  the  harsh  and  blind- 
ing gilt  of  palaces  and  temples,  how  many  statues, 
how  many  inscriptions  endeavoured  to  keep  an 
obscure  memory  green,  or  the  features  of  some  un- 
known man  !  Of  course,  at  Carthage  too,  where 
they  copied  Rome,  as  in  all  the  big  cities,  there  were 
statues  and  inscriptions  in  abundance  upon  the 
Forum,  the  squares,  and  in  the  public  baths.  But 
what  had  not  shocked  Augustin  in  his  native  land, 
did  shock  him  in  a  strange  city.  His  home-sick 
eyes  opened  to  faults  which  till  then  had  been  veiled 
by  usage.  In  any  case,  this  craze  for  statues  and 
inscriptions  prevailed  at  Rome  more  than  anywhere 
else.  The  number  of  statues  on  the  Forum  became 
so  inconvenient,  that  on  many  occasions  certain 
ones  were  marked  for  felling,  and  the  more  insig- 
nificant shifted.  The  men  of  stone  drove  out  the 
living  men,  and  forced  the  gods  into  their  temples. 
And  the  inscriptions  on  the  walls  bewildered  the 
mind  with  such  a  noise  of  human  praise,  that  ambi- 
tion could  dream  of  nothing  beyond.  It  was  all  a 
kind  of  idolatry  which  revolted  the  strict  Christians  ; 
and  in  Augustin,  even  at  this  time,  it  must  have 
offended  the  candour  of  a  soul  which  detested 
exaggeration  and  bombast. 

The  vices  of  the  Roman  people,  with  whom  he 


THE  CITY   OF  GOLD  149 

was  obliged  to  live  cheek  by  jowl,  galled  him  still 
more  painfully.  And  to  begin  with,  the  natives 
hated  strangers.  At  the  theatres  they  used  to  shout  : 
"  Down  with  the  foreign  residents  !  "  Acute  attacks 
of  xenophobia  often  caused  riots  in  the  city.  Some 
years  before  Augustin  arrived,  a  panic  about  the 
food  supply  led  to  the  expulsion,  as  useless  mouths, 
of  all  foreigners  domiciled  in  Rome,  even  the  pro- 
fessors. Famine  was  an  endemic  disease  there.  And 
then,  these  lazy  people  were  always  hungry.  The 
gluttony  and  drunkenness  of  the  Romans  roused 
the  wonder  and  also  the  disgust  of  the  sober  races 
of  the  Empire — of  the  Greeks  as  well  as  the  Afri- 
cans. They  ate  everywhere — in  the  streets,  at  the 
theatre,  at  the  circus,  around  the  temples.  The 
sight  was  so  ignoble,  and  the  public  intemperance 
so  scandalous,  that  the  Prefect,  Ampelius,  was 
obliged  to  issue  an  order  prohibiting  people  who 
had  any  self-respect  from  eating  in  the  street,  the 
keepers  of  wine-shops  from  opening  their  places 
before  ten  o'clock  in  the  morning,  and  the  hawkers 
from  selhng  cooked  meat  in  the  streets  earlier  than  a 
certain  hour  of  the  day.  But  he  might  as  well  have 
saved  himself  the  trouble.  Religion  itself  encouraged 
this  greediness.  The  pagan  sacrifices  were  scarcely 
more  than  pretexts  for  stuffing.  Under  Julian,  who 
carried  the  great  public  sacrifices  of  oxen  to  an 
abusive  extent,  the  soldiers  got  drunk  and  gorged 
themselves  with  meat  in  the  temples,  and  came  out 
staggering.  Then  they  would  seize  hold  of  any 
passers-by,  whom  they  forced  to  carry  them  shoulder- 
high  to  their  barracks. 

All  this  must  be  kept  in  mind  so  as  to  understand 
the  strictness  and  unyielding  attitude  of  the  Chris- 


150  SAINT   AUGUSTIN 

tian  reaction.  This  Roman  people,  like  the  pagans 
in  general,  was  frightfully  material  and  sensual. 
The  difficulty  of  shaking  himself  free  from  matter 
and  the  senses  is  going  to  be  the  great  obstacle 
which  delays  Augustin's  conversion  ;  and  if  it  was 
so  with  him,  a  fastidious  and  intellectual  man,  what 
about  the  crowd  ?  Those  people  thought  of  nothing 
but  eating  and  drinking  and  lewdness.  When  they 
left  the  tavern  or  their  squalid  rooms,  they  had  only 
the  obscenities  of  mimes,  or  the  tumbles  of  the  drivers 
in  the  circus,  or  the  butcheries  in  the  amphitheatre 
to  elevate  them.  They  passed  the  night  there  under 
the  awnings  provided  by  the  municipality.  Their 
passion  for  horse-races  and  actors  and  actresses, 
curbed  though  it  was  by  the  Christian  emperors, 
continued  even  after  the  sack  of  Rome  b}^  the  Bar- 
barians. At  the  time  of  the  famine,  when  the  stran- 
gers were  expelled,  they  excepted  from  this  whole- 
sale banishment  three  thousand  female  dancers  with 
the  members  of  their  choirs,  and  their  leaders  of 
orchestra. 

The  aristocracy  did  not  manifest  tastes  much 
superior.  Save  a  few  cultivated  minds,  sincerely  fond 
of  literature,  the  greatest  number  only  saw  in  the 
literary  pose  an  easy  way  of  being  fashionable. 
These  became  infatuated  about  an  unknown  author, 
or  an  ancient  author  whose  books  were  not  to  be  had. 
They  had  these  books  sought  for  and  beautifully 
copied.  They,  "who  hated  study  like  poison,"  spoke 
only  of  their  favourite  author  :  the  others  did  not 
exist  for  them.  As  a  matter  of  fact,  music  had 
ousted  literature  :  "  the  libraries  were  closed  like 
sepulchres."  But  fashionable  people  were  interested 
in  an  hydraulic  organ,  and  they  ordered  from  the 


THE   CITY   OF  GOLD  151 

lute-makers  "lyres  the  size  of  chariots."  Of 
course,  this  musical  craze  was  sheer  affectation. 
Actually,  they  were  only  interested  in  sports : 
to  race,  to  arrange  races,  to  breed  horses,  to 
train  athletes  and  gladiators.  As  a  pastime, 
they  collected  Oriental  stuffs.  Silk  was  then 
fashionable,  and  so  were  precious  stones,  enamels, 
heavy  goldsmiths'  work.  Rows  of  rings  were  worn 
on  each  finger.  People  took  the  air  in  silk  robes, 
held  together  by  brooches  carved  in  the  figures  of 
animals,  a  parasol  in  one  hand,  and  a  fan  with 
gold  fringes  in  the  other.  The  costumes  and  fashions 
of  Constantinople  encroached  upon  the  old  Rome 
and  the  rest  of  the  Western  world. 

Immense  fortunes,  which  had  gathered  in  the 
hands  of  certain  people,  either  through  inheritance 
or  swindling,  enabled  them  to  keep  up  a  senseless 
expenditure.  Like  the  American  millionaires  of  to- 
day, who  have  their  houses  and  properties  in  both 
hemispheres,  these  great  Roman  lords  possessed 
them  in  every  country  in  the  Empire.  Symmachus, 
who  was  Prefect  of  the  City  when  Augustin  was  in 
Rome,  had  considerable  estates  not  only  in  Italy 
and  in  Sicily,  but  even  in  Mauretania.  And  yet,  in 
spite  of  all  their  wealth  and  all  the  privileges  they 
enjoyed,  these  rich  people  were  neither  happy  nor 
at  ease.  At  the  least  suspicion  of  a  despotic  power, 
their  lives  and  property  were  threatened.  Accusa- 
tions of  magic,  of  disrespect  to  the  Caesar,  of  plots 
against  the  Emperor — any  pretext  was  good  to 
plunder  them.  During  the  preceding  reign,  that  of 
the  pitiless  Valentinian,  the  Roman  nobility  had 
been  literally  decimated  by  the  executioner.  A 
certain  vice-Prefect,  Maximinus,  had  gained  a  sinister 


152  SAINT   AUGUSTIN 

reputation  for  cleverness  in  the  art  of  manufacturing 
suspects.  By  his  orders,  a  basket  at  the  end  of  a 
string  was  hung  out  from  one  of  the  windows  of  the 
Praetorium,  into  which  denunciations  might  be 
cast.    The  basket  was  in  use  day  and  night. 

It  is  clear  that  at  the  time  that  Augustin  settled 
in  Rome  this  abominable  system  was  a  little  moder- 
ated. But  accusation  by  detectives  was  always 
in  the  air.  And  living  in  this  atmosphere  of  mis- 
trust, hypocrisy,  bribery,  and  cruelty — small  wonder 
if  the  Carthaginian  fell  into  bitter  reflections  upon 
Roman  corruption.  However  impressive  from  the 
front,  the  Empire  was  not  nice  to  look  at  close  at 
hand. 

But  Augustin  was,  above  all,  home-sick.  When  he 
strolled  under  the  shady  trees  of  the  Janiculam  or 
Sallust's  gardens,  he  already  said  to  himself  what  he 
would  repeat  later  to  his  listeners  at  Hippo  :  "  Take 
an  African,  put  him  in  a  place  cool  and  green,  and 
he  won't  stay  there.  He  will  feel  he  must  go  away 
and  come  back  to  his  blazing  desert."  As  for 
himself,  he  had  something  better  to  regret  than  a 
blazing  desert.  In  front  of  the  City  of  Gold,  stretched 
out  at  his  feet,  and  the  horizon  of  the  Sabine  Hills, 
he  remembered  the  feminine  softness  of  the  twilights 
upon  the  Lake  of  Tunis,  the  enchantment  of  moonlit 
nights  upon  the  Gulf  of  Carthage,  and  that  astonish- 
ing landscape  to  be  discovered  from  the  height  of 
the  terrace  of  Byrsa,  which  all  the  grandeur  of  the 
Roman  campagna  could  not  make  him  forget. 


II 

THE   FINAL   DISILLUSION 

THE  new  professor  had  managed  to  secure  a  cer- 
tain number  of  pupils  whom  he  gathered  together 
in  his  rooms.  He  could  make  enough  to  live  at  Rome 
by  himself,  if  he  could  not  support  there  the  woman 
and  child  he  had  left  behind  at  Carthage.  In  this 
matter  of  finding  work,  his  host  and  his  Manichee 
friends  had  done  him  some  very  good  turns.  Al- 
though forced  to  conceal  their  beliefs  since  the  edict 
of  Theodosius,  there  were  a  good  many  Manichees 
in  the  city.  They  formed  an  occult  Church,  strongly 
organized,  and  its  adepts  had  relations  with  all 
classes  of  Roman  society.  Possibly  Augustin  presented 
himself  as  one  driven  out  of  Africa  by  the  persecu- 
tion. Some  compensation  would  be  owing  to  this 
young  man  who  had  suffered  for  the  good  cause. 

It  was  his  friend  Alypius,  "  the  brother  of  his 
heart,"  who,  having  preceded  him  to  Rome  to  study 
law  at  his  parents'  wishes,  now  was  the  most  useful 
in  helping  Augustin  to  make  himself  known  and  find 
pupils.  Himself  a  Manichee,  converted  by  Augustin, 
and  a  member  of  one  of  the  leading  families  in 
Thagaste,  he  had  not  long  to  wait  for  an  important 
appointment  in  the  Imperial  administration.  He 
was  assessor  to  the  Treasurer-General,  or  "  Count  of 
the  Italian  Bounty  Office,"  and  decided  fiscal 
questions.     Thanks  to  his  influence,  as  well  as  to 

153 


154  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

his  acquaintances  among  the  Manichees,  he  was  a 
valuable  friend  for  the  new  arrival,  a  friend  who 
could  aid  him,  not  only  with  his  purse,  but  with 
advice.  Without  much  capacity  for  theorizing, 
this  Alypius  was  a  practical  spirit,  a  straight  and 
essentially  honest  soul,  whose  influence  was  excellent 
for  his  impetuous  friend.  Of  very  chaste  habits,  he 
urged  Augustin  to  restraint.  And  even  in  abstract 
studies,  the  religious  controversies  which  Augustin 
dragged  him  into,  his  strong  good  sense  moderated 
the  imaginative  dashes,  the  overmuch  subtilty 
which  sometimes  led  the  other  beyond  healthy 
reason. 

Unhappily  they  were  both  very  busy — the  judge 
and  the  rhetorician — and  although  their  friendship 
became  still  greater  during  this  stay  in  Rome,  they 
were  not  able  to  see  each  other  as  much  as  they 
desired.  Their  pleasures,  too,  were  perhaps  not  the 
same.  Augustin  did  not  in  the  least  care  about  being 
chaste,  and  Alypius  had  a  passion  for  the  amphi- 
theatre— a  passion  which  his  friend  disapproved 
of.  Some  time  earlier,  at  Carthage,  Augustin 
had  filled  him  with  disgust  of  the  circus.  But 
hardly  was  Alypius  arrived  in  Rome,  than  he  became 
mad  about  the  gladiatorial  shows.  Some  fellow- 
students  took  him  to  the  amphitheatre,  almost  by 
force.  Thereupon,  he  said  that  he  would  stay,  since 
they  had  dragged  him  there ;  but  he  bet  that  he  would 
keep  his  eyes  shut  all  through  the  fight,  and  that 
nothing  could  make  him  open  them.  He  sat  down 
on  the  benches  with  those  who  had  brought  him, 
his  eyelids  pressed  down,  refusing  to  look.  Suddenly 
there  was  a  roar  of  shouting,  the  shout  of  the 
crowd  hailing  the  fall  of  the  first  wounded.    His  lids 


THE   FINAL   DISILLUSION  155 

parted  of  themselves;  he  saw  the  flow  of  blood. 
"  At  the  sight  of  the  blood,"  says  Augustin,  "  he 
drank  in  ruthlessness  ;  no  longer  did  he  turn  away, 
but  fixed  his  gaze,  and  he  became  mad — and  he 
knew  no  more.  ...  He  was  fascinated  by  the 
criminal  atrocity  of  this  battle,  and  drunk  with  the 
pleasure  of  blood." 

These  breathless  phrases  of  the  Confessions  seem 
to  throb  still  with  the  wild  frenzy  of  the  crowd. 
They  convey  to  us  directly  the  kind  of  Sadie  excite- 
ment which  people  went  to  find  about  the  arena. 
Really,  a  wholesome  sight  for  future  Christians, 
for  all  the  souls  that  the  brutality  of  pagan  customs 
revolted  !  The  very  year  that  Augustin  was  at 
Rome,  certain  prisoners  of  war,  Sarmatian  soldiers, 
condemned  to  kill  each  other  in  the  amphitheatre, 
chose  suicide  rather  than  this  shameful  death. 
There  was  in  this  something  to  make  him  reflect — 
him  and  his  friends.  The  fundamental  injustices 
whereon  the  ancient  world  rested — the  crushing  of 
the  slave  and  the  conquered,  the  contempt  for 
human  life — these  things  they  touched  with  the 
finger  when  they  looked  on  at  the  butcheries  in  the 
amphitheatre.  All  those  whose  hearts  sickened 
with  disgust  and  horror  before  these  slaughter-house 
scenes,  all  those  who  longed  for  a  little  more  mild- 
ness, a  little  more  justice,  were  all  recruits  marked 
out  for  the  peaceful  army  of  the  Christ. 

For  Alypius,  especially,  it  was  not  a  bad  thing  to 
have  known  this  blood-drunkenness  at  first  hand  : 
he  shall  be  only  the  more  ashamed  when  he  falls  at 
the  feet  of  the  merciful  God.  Equally  useful  was 
it  for  him  to  have  personal  experience  of  the  harsh- 
ness of  men's  justice  ;    and  in  the  fulfilment  of  his 


156  SAINT   AUGUSTIN 

duties  as  a  judge  to  observe  its  errors  and  flaws. 
While  he  was  a  student  at  Carthage  he  just  escaped 
being  condemned  to  death  upon  a  false  accusa- 
tion of  theft — the  theft  of  a  piece  of  lead  !  Already 
they  were  dragging  him,  if  not  to  the  place  of 
capital  punishment,  at  least  to  prison,  when  a 
chance  meeting  with  a  friend  of  his  who  was  a 
senator  saved  him  from  the  threatening  mob.  At 
Rome,  while  Assessor  to  the  Count  of  the  Italian 
Bounty  Office,  he  had  to  resist  an  attempt  to  bribe 
him,  and  by  doing  so  risked  losing  his  appointment, 
and,  no  doubt,  something  worse  too.  Official 
venahty  and  dishonesty  were  evils  so  deeply  rooted, 
that  he  himself  nearly  succumbed.  He  wanted  some 
books  copied,  and  he  had  the  temptation  to  get  this 
done  at  the  charge  of  the  Treasur^^  This  pecula- 
tion had,  in  his  eyes,  a  good  enough  excuse,  and  it 
was  certain  to  go  undetected.  Nevertheless,  when 
he  thought  it  over  he  changed  his  mind,  and  vir- 
tuously refrained  from  giving  himself  a  library  at 
the  expense  of  the  State. 

Augustin,  who  relates  these  anecdotes,  draws  the 
same  moral  from  them  as  we  do,  to  wit — that  for 
a  man  who  was  going  to  be  a  bishop  and,  as  such, 
administrator  and  judge,  this  time  spent  in  the 
Government  service  was  a  good  preparatory  school. 
Most  of  the  other  great  leaders  of  this  generation 
of  Christians  had  also  been  officials  ;  before  ordina- 
tion, they  had  been  mixed  up  in  business  and 
politics,  and  had  lived  freely  the  life  of  their  cen- 
tury. So  it  was  with  St.  Ambrose,  with  St.  Pauhnus 
of  Nola,  with  Augustin  himself,  and  Evodius  and 
Alypius,  his  friends. 

And  yet,   however  absorbed  in  their  work   the 


THE   FINAL   DISILLUSION  157 

two  Africans  might  be,  it  is  pretty  near  certain  that 
intellectual  questions  took  the  lead  of  all  others. 
This  is  manifest  in  Augustin's  case  at  least.  He 
must  have  astonished  the  good  Alypius  when  he 
got  to  Rome  by  acknowledging  that  he  hardly 
believed  in  Manicheeism  any  longer.  And  he  set 
forth  his  doubts  about  their  masters'  cosmogony 
and  physical  science,  his  suspicions  touching  the 
hidden  immorality  of  the  sect.  As  for  himself,  the 
controversies,  which  were  the  Manichees'  strong 
point,  did  not  dazzle  him  any  longer.  At  Carthage, 
but  lately,  he  had  heard  a  Catholic,  a  certain  Hel- 
pidius,  oppose  to  them  arguments  from  Scripture, 
which  they  were  unable  to  refute.  To  make  matters 
worse,  the  Manichee  Bishop  of  Rome  made  a  bad 
impression  on  him  from  the  very  outset.  This  man, 
he  tells  us,  was  of  rough  appearance,  without  cul- 
ture or  polite  manners.  Doubtless  this  unmannerly 
peasant,  in  his  reception  of  the  young  professor, 
had  not  shewn  himself  sufficient^  alive  to  his 
merits,  and  the  professor  felt  aggrieved. 

From  then,  his  keen  dialectic  and  his  satirical 
spirit  (Augustin  had  formidable  powers  of  ridicule 
all  through  his  life)  were  exercised  upon  the  backs 
of  his  fellow-religionists.  Provisionally,  he  had 
admitted  as  indisputable  the  basic  principles  of 
Manicheeism  :  first  of  all,  the  primordial  antagonism 
of  the  two  substances,  the  God  of  Light  and  the  God 
of  Darkness  ;  then,  this  other  dogma,  that  particles 
of  that  Divine  Light,  which  had  been  carried  away 
in  a  temporary  victory  of  the  army  of  Darkness, 
were  immersed  in  certain  plants  and  liquors.  Hence, 
the  distinction  they  made  betw^een  clean  and  un- 
clean food.     All  those  foods  were  pure  which  con- 


158  SAINT   AUGUSTIN 

tained  some  part  of  the  Divine  Light;  impure, 
those  which  did  not.  The  purity  of  food  became 
evident  by  certain  quaUties  of  taste,  smell,  and 
appearance.  But  now  Augustin  found  a  good  deal 
of  arbitrariness  in  these  distinctions,  and  a  good 
deal  of  simplicity  in  the  belief  that  the  Divine  Light 
dwelt  in  a  vegetable.  "  Are  they  not  ashamed," 
he  said,  "  to  search  God  with  their  palates  or  with 
their  nose  ?  And  if  His  presence  is  revealed  by 
a  special  brilliancy,  by  the  goodness  of  the  taste  or 
the  smell,  why  allow  that  dish  and  condemn  this, 
which  is  of  equal  savour,  light,  and  perfume  ? 

"  Yea,  why  do  they  look  upon  the  golden  melon 
as  come  out  of  God's  treasure-house,  and  yet  will 
have  none  of  the  golden  fat  of  the  ham  or  the 
yellow  of  an  egg  ?  Why  does  the  whiteness  of 
lettuce  proclaim  to  them  the  Divinity,  and  the 
whiteness  of  cream  nothing  at  all  ?  And  why  this 
horror  of  meat  ?  For,  look  you,  roast  sucking-pig 
offers  us  a  brilliant  colour,  an  agreeable  smell,  and 
an  appetizing  taste — sure  signs,  according  to  them, 
of  the  Divine  Presence."  .  .  .  Once  started  on  this 
topic,  Augustin's  vivacitj^  has  no  limits.  He 
even  drops  into  jokes  which  would  offend  modern 
shamefacedness  by  their  Aristophanic  breadth. 

These  arguments,  to  say  the  truth,  did  not  shake 
the  foundations  of  the  doctrine,  and  if  a  doctrine 
must  be  judged  according  to  its  works,  the  Manichees 
might  entrench  themselves  behind  their  rigid  moral 
rules,  and  their  conduct.  Contrary  to  the  more 
accommodating  Catholicism,  they  paraded  a  puritan 
intolerance.  But  Augustin  had  found  out  at 
Carthage  that  this  austerity  was  for  the  most  part 
hypocrisy.    At  Rome  he  was  thoroughly  enlightened. 


THE   FINAL   DISILLUSION  159 

The  Elect  of  the  rehgion  made  a  great  impression 
by  their  fasts  and  their  abstinence  from  meat.  Now 
it  became  clear  that  these  devout  personages,  under 
pious  pretexts,  literally  destroyed  themselves  by 
over-eating  and  indigestion.  They  held,  in  fact, 
that  the  chief  work  of  piety  consisted  in  setting  free 
particles  of  the  Divine  Light,  imprisoned  in  matter 
by  the  wiles  of  the  God  of  Darkness.  They  being 
the  Pure,  they  purified  matter  by  absorbing  it  into 
their  bodies.  The  faithful  brought  them  stores  of 
fruit  and  vegetables,  served  them  with  real  feasts, 
so  that  by  eating  these  things  they  might  liberate 
a  little  of  the  Divine  Substance.  Of  course,  they 
abstained  from  all  flesh,  flesh  being  the  dwelling- 
place  of  the  Dark  God,  and  also  from  fermented 
wine,  which  they  called  "  the  devil's  gall."  But 
how  they  made  up  for  it  over  the  rest  !  Augustin 
makes  great  fun  of  these  people  who  would  think  it 
a  sin  if  they  took  as  a  full  meal  a  small  bit  of 
bacon  and  cabbage,  with  two  or  three  mouthfuls 
of  undiluted  wine,  and  yet  ordered  to  be  served 
up,  from  three  o'clock  in  the  afternoon,  all  kinds  of 
fruit  and  vegetables,  the  most  exquisite  too,  ren- 
dered piquant  by  spices,  the  Manichees  holding  that 
spices  were  very  full  of  fiery  and  luminous  prin- 
ciples. Then,  their  palates  titillating  from  pepper, 
they  swallowed  large  draughts  of  mulled  wine  or 
wine  and  honey,  and  the  juice  of  oranges,  lemons, 
and  grapes.  And  these  junketings  began  over  again 
at  nightfall.  They  had  a  preference  for  certain 
cakes,  and  especially  for  truffles  and  mushrooms — 
vegetables  more  particularly  mystic. 

Such  a  diet  put  human  gluttony  to  a  heavy  test. 
Many  a  scandal  came  to  light  in  the  Roman  com- 


i6o  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

munity.  The  Elect  made  themselves  sick  by 
devouring  the  prodigious  quantity  of  good  cheer 
brought  to  them  with  a  view  to  purification.  As 
it  was  a  sacrilege  to  let  any  be  lost,  the  unhappy 
people  forced  themselves  to  get  down  the  lot.  There 
were  even  victims  :  children,  gorged  with  delicacies, 
died  of  stuffing.  For  children,  being  innocent  things, 
were  deemed  to  have  quite  special  purifying  virtues. 

Augustin  was  beginning  to  get  indignant  at  all  this 
nonsense.  Still,  except  for  these  extravagances,  he 
continued  to  believe  in  the  asceticism  of  the  Elect 
— asceticism  of  such  severity  that  the  main  part 
of  the  faithful  found  it  impossible  to  practise.  And 
see  !  just  at  this  moment,  whom  should  he  discover 
very  strange  things  about  but  Bishop  Faustus,  that 
Faustus  whom  he  had  looked  for  at  Carthage  as 
a  Messiah.  The  holy  man,  while  he  preached 
renunciation,  granted  himself  a  good  many  in- 
dulgences :  he  lay,  for  one  thing,  on  feathers,  or 
upon  soft  goatskin  rugs.  And  these  puritans  were 
not  even  honest.  The  Manichee  Bishop  of  Rome, 
that  man  of  rough  manners  who  had  so  offended 
Augustin,  was  on  the  point  of  being  convicted  of 
stealing  the  general  cash-box.  Lastly,  there  were 
rumours  in  the  air,  accusing  the  Elect  of  giving 
themselves  over  to  reprehensible  practices  in  their 
private  meetings.  They  condemned  marriage  and 
child-bearing  as  works  of  the  devil,  but  they 
authorized  fornication,  and  even,  it  is  said,  certain 
acts  against  nature.  That,  for  Augustin,  was  the 
final  disillusion. 

In  spite  of  it,  he  did  not  separate  openly  from 
the  sect.  He  kept  his  rank  of  auditor  in  the 
Manichee    Church.      What    held    him    to    it,    were 


THE  FINAL   DISILLUSION  i6i 

some  plausible  considerations  on  the  intellectual 
side.  Manicheeism,  with  its  distinction  of  two 
Principles,  accounted  conveniently  for  the  problem 
of  evil  and  human  responsibility.  Neither  God 
nor  man  was  answerable  for  sin  and  pain,  since  it 
was  the  other,  the  Dark  Principle,  who  distributed 
them  through  the  world  among  men.  Augustin, 
who  continued  to  sin,  continued  likewise  to  be 
very  comfortable  with  such  a  system  of  morals 
and  metaphysics.  Besides,  he  was  not  one  of  those 
convinced,  downright  minds  who  feel  the  need  to 
quarrel  noisily  with  what  they  take  to  be  error. 
No  one  has  opposed  heresies  more  powerful^,  and 
with  a  more  tireless  patience,  than  he  has.  But  he 
always  put  some  consideration  into  the  business.  He 
knew  by  experience  how  easy  it  is  to  fall  into  error, 
and  he  said  this  charitably  to  those  whom  he 
wished  to  persuade.  There  was  nothing  about  him 
like  St.  Jerome. 

Personal  reasons,  moreover,  obliged  him  not  to 
break  with  his  fellow-religionists  who  had  supported 
him,  nursed  him  even,  on  his  arrival  at  Rome, 
and  who,  as  we  shall  see  in  a  moment,  might  still 
do  him  services.  Augustin  was  not,  like  his  friend 
Alypius,  a  practical  mind,  but  he  had  tact,  and  in 
spite  of  all  the  impulsiveness  and  mettle  of  his 
nature,  a  certain  suppleness  which  enabled  him  to 
manoeuvre  without  too  many  collisions  in  the  midst 
of  the  most  embarrassing  conjunctures.  Through 
instinctive  prudence  he  prolonged  his  indecision. 
Little  by  little,  he  who  had  formerly  flung  himself 
so  enthusiastically  in  pursuit  of  Truth,  glided  into 
scepticism — the  scepticism  of  the  Academics  in  its 
usual  form. 

M 


i62  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

And  at  the  same  time  that  he  lost  his  taste  for 
speculative  thinking,  new  annoyances  in  his  pro- 
fession put  the  finishing  touch  on  his  discourage- 
ment. If  the  Roman  students  were  less  noisy  than 
those  of  Carthage,  they  had  a  deplorable  habit  of 
walking  off  and  leaving  their  masters  unpaid. 
Augustin  was  ere  long  victimized  in  this  way  :  he 
lost  his  time  and  his  words.  As  at  Carthage,  so 
at  Rome,  he  had  to  face  the  fact  that  he  could  not 
live  by  his  profession.  What  was  he  to  do  ?  Would 
he  have  to  go  back  home  ?  He  had  fallen  into 
despair,  when  an  unforeseen  chance  turned  up  for 
him. 

The  town  council  of  Milan  threw  open  a  professor- 
ship of  Rhetoric  to  public  competition.  It  would 
be  salvation  for  him  if  he  could  get  appointed. 
For  a  long  time  he  had  wanted  a  post  in  the  State 
education.  In  receipt  of  a  fixed  salary,  he  would 
no  longer  have  to  worry  about  beating  up  a  class, 
or  to  guard  against  the  dishonesty  of  his  pupils. 
He  put  his  name  down  immediatel}^  among  the 
candidates.  But  no  more  in  those  days  than  in 
ours  was  simple  merit  by  itself  enough.  It  was 
necessary  to  pull  strings.  His  friends  the  Mani- 
chees  undertook  to  do  this  for  him.  They  urged 
his  claims  warmly  on  the  Prefect  Symmachus,  who 
doubtless  presided  at  the  competitive  trials.  By 
an  amusing  irony  of  fate,  Augustin  owed  his  place 
to  people  he  was  getting  ready  to  separate  from, 
whom  even  he  was  soon  going  to  attack,  and  also 
to  a  man  who  was  in  a  way  the  official  enemy  of 
Christianity.  The  pagan  Symmachus  appointing 
to  an  important  post  a  future  Catholic  bishop — 
there  is  matter  for  surprise  in  that  !     But   Sym- 


THE   FINAL   DISILLUSION  163 

machus,  who  had  been  Proconsul  at  Carthage, 
protected  the  Africans  in  Rome.  Furthermore,  it 
is  hkely  that  the  Manichees  represented  their  candi- 
date to  him  as  a  man  hostile  to  Catholics.  Now  in 
this  year,  a.d.  384,  the  Prefect  had  just  begun  an 
open  struggle  with  the  Catholics.  He  believed, 
therefore,  that  he  made  a  good  choice  in  appointing 
Augustin. 

So  a  chain  of  events,  with  which  his  will  had 
hardly  anything  to  do,  was  going  to  draw  the  young 
rhetorician  to  Milan — yes,  and  how  much  farther  ! — 
to  where  he  did  not  want  to  go,  to  where  the  prayers 
of  Monnica  summoned  him  unceasingly :  "  Where 
I  am,  there  shall  you  be  also."  When  he  was  leaving 
Rome,  he  did  not  much  expect  that.  What  he 
chiefly  thought  of  was  that  he  had  at  last  won  an 
independent  financial  position,  and  that  he  was 
become  an  official  of  some  importance.  He  had  a 
flattering  evidence  of  this  at  once  :  It  was  at  the 
expense  of  the  city  of  Milan  and  in  the  Imperial 
carriages  that  he  travelled  through  Italy  to  take 
up  his  new  post. 


Ill 


THE   MEETING    BETWEEN   AMBROSE   AND 
AUGUSTIN 

BEFORE  he  left  Rome,  and  during  his  journey 
to  Milan,  Augustin  must  have  recalled  more 
than  once  the  verses  of  Terence  which  his  friend 
Marcianus  had  quoted  by  way  of  encouragement 
and  advice  the  night  he  set  sail  for  Italy  : 

"This  day  which  brings  to  thee  another  Hfe 
Demands  that  thou  another  man  shalt  be." 

He  was  thirty  years  old.  The  time  of  youthful 
wilfulness  was  over.  Age,  disappointments,  the  diffi- 
culties of  life,  had  developed  his  character.  He  was 
now  become  a  man  of  position,  an  eminent  official, 
in  a  very  large  city  which  was  the  second  capital  of 
the  Western  Empire  and  the  principal  residence  of 
the  Court.  If  he  wished  to  avoid  further  set-backs 
in  his  career,  it  behoved  him  to  choose  a  line  of 
conduct  carefully  thought  out. 

And  first  of  all,  it  was  time  to  get  rid  of  Mani- 
cheeism.  A  Manichee  would  have  made  a  scandal 
in  a  city  where  the  greatest  part  of  the  population 
was  Christian,  and  the  Court  was  Catholic,  al- 
though it  did  not  conceal  its  sympathy  with 
Arianism.  It  was  a  long  time  now  since  Augustin 
had  been  a  Manichee  in  his  heart.  Accordingly,  he  was 
not  obliged  to  feign  in  order  to  re-enter  a  Church 
which   already   included   him   formally   among   its 

164 


AMBROSE   AND   AUGUSTIN  165 

catechumens.  Doubtless  he  was  a  very  lukewarm 
catechumen,  since  at  intervals  he  inclined  to 
scepticism.  But  he  thought  it  decent  to  remain, 
at  least  for  the  time  being,  in  the  Catholic  body, 
in  which  his  mother  had  brought  him  up,  until  the 
day  when  some  sure  light  should  arise  to  direct 
his  path.  Now  St.  Ambrose  was  at  that  time  the 
Catholic  Bishop  of  Milan.  Augustin  was  very  eager 
to  gain  his  goodwill.  Ambrose  was  an  undoubted 
political  power,  an  important  personage,  a  celebrated 
orator  whose  renown  was  shed  all  across  the  Roman 
world.  He  belonged  to  an  illustrious  family.  His 
father  had  been  Praetorian  prefect  of  Gaul.  He 
himself,  with  the  title  of  Consul,  was  governing  the 
provinces  of  Emilia  and  Liguria  when  the  Milanese 
forced  him,  much  against  his  will,  to  become  their 
bishop.  Baptized,  ordained  priest,  and  consecrated, 
one  on  top  of  the  other,  it  was  only  apparently  that 
he  gave  up  his  civil  functions.  From  the  height  of 
his  episcopal  throne  he  always  personified  the 
highest  authority  in  the  country. 

As  soon  as  he  arrived  at  Milan,  Augustin  hurried 
to  call  upon  his  bishop.  Knowing  him  as  we  do, 
he  must  have  approached  Ambrose  in  a  great  trans- 
port of  enthusiasm.  His  imagination,  too,  was 
kindled.  In  his  thought  this  was  a  man  of  letters, 
an  orator,  a  famous  writer,  almost  a  fellow-worker, 
that  he  was  going  to  see.  The  young  professor 
admired  in  Bishop  Ambrose  all  the  glory  that  he 
was  ambitious  of,  and  all  that  he  already  believed 
himself  to  be.  He  fancied,  that  however  great 
might  be  the  difference  in  their  positions,  he  would 
find  himself  at  once  on  an  equal  footing  with  this 
high  personage,  and  would  have  a  familiar  talk  with 


i66  SAINT   AUGUSTIN 

him,  as  he  used  to  have  at  Carthage  with  the  Pro- 
consul Vindicianus.  He  told  himself  also  that 
Ambrose  was  a  priest,  that  is  to  say,  a  doctor  of 
souls  :  he  meant  to  open  to  him  all  his  spiritual 
wretchedness,  the  anguish  of  his  mind  and  heart. 
He  expected  consolation  from  him,  if  not  cure. 

Well,  he  was  mistaken.  Although  in  all  his 
writings  he  speaks  of  **  the  holy  Bishop  of  Milan  " 
with  feelings  of  sincere  respect  and  admiration,  he 
lets  it  be  understood  that  his  expectations  were 
not  realized.  If  the  Manichean  bishop  of  Rome  had 
offended  him  by  his  rough  manners,  Ambrose  dis- 
concerted him  alike  by  his  politeness,  his  kindliness, 
and  by  the  reserve,  perhaps  invohmtarily  haught}^ 
of  his  reception.  "  He  received  me,"  says  Augustin, 
"  like  a  father,  and  as  a  bishop  he  was  pleased 
enough  at  my  coming  :  " — peregrinationem  meam 
satis  episcopaliter  dilexit.  This  satis  episcopaliter 
looks  very  like  a  sly  banter  at  the  expense  of  the 
saint.  It  is  infinitely  probable  that  St.  Ambrose 
received  Augustin,  not  exactly  as  a  man  of  no 
account,  but  still,  as  a  sheep  of  his  flock,  and  not 
as  a  gifted  orator,  and  that,  in  short,  he  shewed  him 
the  same  "  episcopal  "  benevolence  as  he  had  from 
a  sense  of  duty  for  all  his  hearers.  It  is  possible 
too  that  Am.brose  was  on  his  guard  from  the  outset 
with  this  African,  appointed  a  municipal  professor 
through  the  good  offices  of  the  pagan  vSymmachus, 
his  personal  enemy.  In  the  opinion  of  the  Italian 
Catholics,  nothing  good  came  from  Carthage  :  these 
Carthaginians  were  generally  Manichees  or  Donatists 
— sectaries  the  more  dangerous  because  they  claimed 
to  be  orthodox,  and,  mingling  with  the  faithful, 
hypocritically  contaminated  them.     And  then  Am- 


AMBROSE   AND   AUGUSTIN  167 

brose,  the  great  lord,  the  former  Governor  of  Liguria, 
the  counsellor  of  the  Emperors,  may  not  have  quite 
concealed  a  certain  ironic  commiseration  for  this 
"  dealer  in  words,"  this  young  rhetorician  who  was 
still  puffed  up  with  his  own  importance. 

Be  this  as  it  will,  it  was  a  lesson  in  humility  that 
St.  Ambrose,  without  intending  it,  gave  to  Augustin. 
The  lesson  was  not  understood.  The  rhetoric  pro- 
fessor gathered  only  one  thing  from  the  visit,  which 
was,  that  the  Bishop  of  Milan  had  received  him  well. 
And  as  human  vanity  immediately  lends  vast 
significance  to  the  least  advances  of  distinguished 
or  powerful  persons,  Augustin  felt  thankful  for  it. 
He  began  to  love  Ambrose  almost  as  much  as  he  ad- 
mired him,  and  he  admired  him  for  reasons  altogether 
worldly.  "  Ambrose  I  counted  one  of  the  happy 
ones  of  this  world,  because  he  was  held  in  such 
honour  by  the  great."  The  qualification  which 
immediately  follows  shews  naively  enough  the  sen- 
sual Augustin's  state  of  mind  at  that  time  :  "  Only 
it  seemed  to  me  that  celibacy  must  be  a  heavy 
burthen  upon  him." 

In  those  3/ears  the  Bishop  of  Milan  might,  indeed, 
pass  for  a  happy  man  in  the  eyes  of  the  world.  He 
was  the  friend  of  the  very  glorious  and  very  vic- 
)rious  Theodosius  ;  he  had  been  the  adviser  of 
the  young  Emperor  Gratian,  but  lately  assassinated ; 
and  although  the  Empress  Justina,  devoted  to  the 
Arians,  plotted  against  him,  he  had  still  great 
influence  in  the  council  of  Valentinian  II — a  little 
Emperor  thirteen  years  old,  whom  a  Court  of  pagans 
and  Arians  endeavoured  to  draw  into  an  anti- 
Catholic  reaction. 

Almost  as  soon  as  Augustin  arrived  in  Milan,  he 


i68  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

was  able  to  see  for  himself  the  great  authority  and 
esteem  which  Ambrose  possessed,  the  occasion  being 
a  dispute  which  made  a  great  noise. 
'  Two  years  earlier,  Gratian  had  had  the  statue 
and  altar  of  Victory  removed  from  the  Curia, 
declaring  that  this  pagan  emblem  and  its  accom- 
paniments no  longer  served  any  purpose  in  an 
assembly  of  which  the  majority  was  Christian. 
By  the  same  stroke,  he  suppressed  the  incomes  of 
the  sacerdotal  colleges  with  all  their  privileges, 
particularly  those  of  the  Vestals ;  confiscated  for  the 
revenue  the  sums  granted  for  the  exercise  of  religion  ; 
seized  the  property  of  the  temples  ;  and  forbade 
the  priests  to  receive  bequests  of  real  estate.  This 
meant  the  complete  separation  of  the  State  and  the 
ancient  religion.  The  pagan  minority  in  the  Senate, 
with  Symmachus,  the  Prefect,  at  its  head,  pro- 
tested against  this  edict.  A  deputation  was  sent 
to  Milan  to  place  the  pagan  grievances  before  the 
Emperor.  Gratian  refused  to  receive  them.  It 
was  thought  that  his  successor,  Valentinian  II, 
being  feebler,  would  be  more  obliging.  A  new 
senatorial  committee  presented  themselves  with  a 
petition  drawn  up  by  Symmachus — a  genuine  piece 
of  oratory  which  Ambrose  himself  admired,  or 
pretended  to  admire.  This  speech  made  a  deep 
impression  when  it  was  read  in  the  Imperial  Council. 
But  Ambrose  intervened  with  all  his  eloquence.  He 
demanded  that  the  common  law  should  be  applied 
equally  to  pagans  as  to  Christians,  and  it  was  he 
who  won  the  dav.  Victory  was  not  replaced  in  the 
Roman  Curia,  neither  were  the  goods  of  the  temples 
returned. 

Augustin  must  have  been  very  much  struck  by 


AMBROSE   AND   AUGUSTIN  169 

this  advantage  which  CathoHcism  had  gained.  It 
became  clear  that  henceforth  this  was  to  be  the 
State  rehgion.  And  he  who  envied  so  much  the 
fortunate  of  the  world,  might  take  note,  besides, 
that  the  new  religion  brought,  along  with  the  faith, 
riches  and  honours  to  its  adepts.  At  Rome  he  had 
listened  to  the  disparaging  by  pagans  and  his 
Manichee  friends  of  the  popes  and  their  clergy. 
They  made  fun  of  the  fashionable  clerics  and  legacy 
hunters.  It  was  related  that  the  Roman  Pontiff, 
servant  of  the  God  of  the  poor,  maintained  a  gorge- 
ous establishment,  and  that  his  table  rivalled  the 
Imperial  table  in  luxury.  The  prefect  Praetextatus, 
a  resolute  pagan,  said  scoffingly  to  Pope  Damasus  : 
"  Make  me  Bishop  of  Rome,  and  I'll  become  a 
Christian  at  once." 

Certainly,  commonplace  human  reasons  can 
neither  bring  about  nor  account  for  a  sincere  con- 
version. Conversion  is  a  divine  work.  But  human 
reasons,  arranged  by  a  mysterious  Will  with  regard 
to  this  work,  may  at  least  prepare  a  soul  for  it. 
Anyhow,  it  cannot  be  neglected  that  Augustin, 
coming  to  Milan  full  of  ambitious  plans,  there  saw 
Catholicism  treated  with  so  much  importance  in 
the  person  of  Ambrose.  This  religion,  which  till 
then  he  had  despised,  now  appeared  to  him  as  a 
triumphant  religion  worth  serving. 

But  though  such  considerations  might  attract 
Augustin's  attention,  they  took  no  hold  on  his  con- 
science. It  was  v/ell  enough  for  an  intriguer  about 
the  Court  to  get  converted  from  self-interest.  As  for 
him,  he  wanted  all  or  nothing  ;  the  chief  good  in  his 
eyes  was  certainty  and  truth.  He  scarcely  believed 
in  this  any  longer,  and  surely  had  no  hope  of  finding 


170  SAINT   AUGUSTIN 

it  among  the  Catholics  ;  but  still  he  went  to  hear 
Ambrose's  sermons.  He  went  in  the  first  place  as 
a  critic  of  language,  with  the  rather  jealous  curiosity 
of  the  trained  man  who  watches  how  another  man 
does  it.  He  wanted  to  judge  himself  if  the  sacred 
orator  was  as  good  as  his  reputation.  The  firm  and 
substantial  eloquence  of  this  former  official,  this 
statesman  who  was  more  than  anything  a  man  of 
action,  immediately  got  control  of  the  frivolous 
rhetorician.  To  be  sure,  he  did  not  find  in  Am- 
brose's sermons  the  exhilaration  or  the  verbal  caress 
which  had  captivated  him  in  those  of  Faustus  the 
Manichean  ;  but  yet  they  had  a  persuasive  grace 
which  held  him.  Augustin  heard  the  bishop  with 
pleasure.  Still,  if  he  liked  to  hear  him  talk, 
he  remained  contemptuous  of  the  doctrine  he 
preached. 

Then,  little  by  little,  this  doctrine  forced  itself 
on  his  meditations  :  he  perceived  that  it  was  more 
serious  than  he  had  thought  hitherto,  or,  at  least, 
that  it  could  be  defended.  Ambrose  had  started  in 
Italy  the  exegetical  methods  of  the  Orientals.  He 
discovered  in  Scripture  allegorical  meanings,  some- 
times edifying,  sometimes  deep,  always  satisfying 
for  a  reasonable  mind.  Augustin,  who  was  inclined 
to  subtilty,  much  relished  these  explanations  which, 
if  ingenious,  were  often  forced.  The  Bible  no  longer 
seemed  to  him  so  absurd.  Finally,  the  immoralities 
which  the  Manichees  made  such  a  great  point  of 
against  the  Holy  Writ,  were  justified,  according  to 
Ambrose,  by  historical  considerations  :  what  God 
did  not  allow  to-day.  He  allowed  formerly  by  reason 
of  the  conditions  of  existence.  However,  though 
the  Bible  might  be  neither  absurd  nor  contrary  to 


AMBROSE   AND   AUGUSTIN  171 

morals,  this  did  not  prove  that  it  was  true.  Augus- 
tin  found  no  outlet  for  his  doubts. 

He  would  have  been  glad  to  have  Ambrose  help 
him  to  get  rid  of  them.  Many  a  time  he  tried  to 
have  a  talk  with  him  about  these  things.  But  the 
Bishop  of  Milan  was  so  very  busy  a  personage  ! 
"  I  could  not  ask  him/'  says  Augustin,  "  what  I 
wanted  as  I  wanted,  because  the  shoals  of  busy 
people  who  consulted  him  about  their  affairs,  and 
to  whose  infirmities  he  ministered,  came  between  me 
and  his  ear  and  lips.  And  in  the  few  moments  when 
he  was  not  thus  surrounded,  he  was  refreshing 
either  his  body  with  needful  food,  or  his  mind  with 
reading.  While  he  read  his  eye  wandered  along  the 
page  and  his  heart  searched  out  the  meaning,  but 
his  voice  and  his  tongue  were  at  rest.  Often  when 
we  attended  (for  the  door  was  open  to  all,  and  no  one 
was  announced),  we  saw  him  reading  silently,  but 
never  otherwise,  and  after  sitting  for  some  time 
without  speaking  (for  who  would  presume  to  trouble 
one  so  occupied  ?)  we  went  away  again.  We  divined 
that,  for  the  little  space  of  time  which  was  all  that 
he  could  secure  for  the  refreshment  of  his  mind,  he 
allowed  himself  a  holiday  from  the  distraction  of 
other  people's  business,  and  did  not  wish  to  be 
interrupted  ;  and  perhaps  he  was  afraid  lest  eager 
listeners  should  invite  him  to  explain  the  harder 
passages  of  his  author,  or  to  enter  upon  the  discussion 
of  difficult  topics,  and  hinder  him  from  perusing  as 
many  volumes  as  he  wished.  .  .  .  Of  course  the  reason 
that  guided  a  man  of  such  remarkable  virtue  must  have 
been  good.  ..." 

Nobody  could  comment  more  subtly — nor,  be  it 
said   also,    more   maliciously — the    attitude    of    St. 


172  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

Ambrose  towards  Augustin,  than  Augustin  himself 
does  it  here.  At  the  time  he  wrote  this  page,  the 
events  he  was  relating  had  happened  a  long  time 
ago.  But  he  is  a  Christian,  and,  in  his  turn,  he  is  a 
bishop  :  he  understands  now  what  he  could  not 
understand  then.  He  feels  thoroughly  at  heart 
that  if  Ambrose  withdrew  himself,  it  was  because 
the  professor  of  rhetoric  was  not  in  a  state  of  mind 
to  have  a  profitable  discussion  with  a  believer  :  he 
lacked  the  necessary  humility  of  heart  and  intellect. 
But  at  the  moment,  he  must  have  taken  things  in 
quite  another  way,  and  have  felt  rather  hurt,  not 
to  say  more,  at  the  bishop's  apparent  indifference. 

Just  picture  a  young  writer  of  to-day,  pretty  well 
convinced  of  his  value,  but  uneasy  about  his  future, 
coming  to  ask  advice  of  an  older  man  already  fa- 
mous— well,  Augustin's  advances  to  Ambrose  were 
not  unlike  that,  save  that  they  had  a  much  more 
serious  character,  since  it  was  not  a  question  of 
literature,  but  of  the  salvation  of  a  soul.  At  this 
period,  what  Augustin  saw  in  Ambrose,  even  when 
he  consulted  him  on  sacred  matters,  was  chiefly 
the  orator,  that  is  to  say,  a  rather  older  rival.  .  .  . 
He  enters.  He  is  shewn  into  the  private  room  of 
the  great  man,  without  being  announced,  like  any 
ordinary  person.  The  great  man  does  not  lay  aside 
his  book  to  greet  him,  does  not  even  speak  a  word 
to  him.  .  .  .  What  would  the  official  professor  of 
Rhetoric  to  the  City  of  Milan  think  of  such  a  recep- 
tion ?  One  can  make  out  clearly  enough  through 
the  lines  of  the  Confessions.  He  said  to  himself 
that  Ambrose,  being  a  bishop,  had  charge  of  souls, 
and  he  was  surprised  that  the  bishop,  no  matter 
how  great  a  lord  he  might  be,  made  no  attempt 


AMBROSE   AND   AUGUSTIN  173 

whatever  to  offer  him  spiritual  aid.  And  as  he  was 
still  devoid  of  Christian  charity,  no  doubt  he  thought 
too  that  Ambrose  was  conscious  that  he  had  not 
the  ability  to  wrestle  with  a  dialectician  of  Augus- 
tin's  strength,  and  that,  into  the  bargain,  the 
prelate  was  to  seek  in  knowledge  of  the  Scriptures. 
And,  in  truth,  Ambrose  had  been  made  a  bishop  so 
suddenly  that  he  must  have  found  himself  obliged 
to  improvise  a  hasty  knowledge.  Anyhow,  Augus- 
tin  concluded  that  if  he  refused  to  discuss,  it  was 
because  he  was  afraid  of  being  at  a  disadvantage. 

Very  surely  St.  Ambrose  had  no  notion  of  what 
the  catechumen  was  thinking.  He  soared  too  high 
to  trouble  about  miserable  stings  to  self-respect. 
In  his  ministr}^  he  was  for  all  alike,  and  he  would 
have  thought  it  against  Christian  equality  to  shew 
any  special  favour  to  Augustin.  If,  in  the  brief 
talks  he  had  with  the  young  rhetorician,  he  was 
able  to  gather  anything  of  his  character,  he  could 
not  have  formed  a  very  favourable  opinion  of  it. 
The  high-strung  temperament  of  the  African,  these 
vague  yearnings  of  the  spirit,  these  sterile  melan- 
cholies, this  continual  temporizing  before  the  faith 
— all  that  could  only  displease  Ambrose,  the  practi- 
cal Roman,  the  official  used  all  his  life  to  command. 

However  that  was,  Augustin,  in  following  years, 
never  allowed  himself  the  least  reproach  towards 
Ambrose.  On  the  contrary,  everywhere  he  loads 
him  with  praise,  quotes  him  repeatedly  in  his 
treatises,  and  takes  refuge  on  his  authority.  He 
calls  him  his  "  father."  But  once,  when  he  is 
speaking  of  the  spiritual  desolation  in  which  he 
was  plunged  at  Milan,  there  does  escape  him  some- 
thing like  a  veiled  complaint  which  appears  to  be 


174  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

aimed  at  Ambrose.  After  recalling  the  eagerness 
with  which  he  sought  truth  in  those  days,  he  adds  : 
"  If  any  one  could  have  been  found  then  to  trouble 
about  instructing  me,  he  would  have  had  a  most 
willing  and  docile  pupil." 

This  phrase,  in  such  marked  contrast  with  so 
many  laudatory  passages  in  the  Confessions  about 
St.  Ambrose,  seems  to  be  indeed  a  statement  of 
the  plain  truth.  If  God  made  use  of  Ambrose  to 
convert  Augustin,  it  is  nevertheless  likely  that 
Ambrose  personally  did  nothing,  or  very  little,  to 
bring  about  this  conversion. 


IV 

PLANS   OF   MARRIAGE 

BUT  even  as  he  draws  nearer  the  goal,  Augustin 
would  appear,  on  the  contrary,  to  get  farther 
away  from  it.  Such  are  God's  secret  paces,  Who 
snatches  souls  like  a  thief :  He  drops  on  them  with- 
out warning.  Till  the  very  eve  of  the  day  when 
Christ  shall  come  to  take  him,  Augustin  will  be  all 
taken  up  with  the  world  and  the  care  of  making 
a  good  figure  in  it. 

Although  Ambrose's  sermons  stimulated  him  to 
reflect  upon  the  great  historical  reality  which 
Christianity  is,  he  had  as  yet  but  dim  glimpses  of 
it.  He  had  given  up  his  superficial  unbelief,  and 
yet  did  not  believe  in  anything  definite.  He  drifted 
into  a  sort  of  agnosticism  compounded  of  mental 
indolence  and  discouragement.  When  he  scrutin- 
ized his  conscience  to  the  depths,  the  most  he  could 
find  was  a  belief  in  the  existence  of  God  and  His 
providence — quite  abstract  ideas  which  he  was 
incapable  of  enlivening.  But  whatever  was  the  use 
of  speculating  upon  Truth  and  the  Sovereign  Good  ! 
The  main  thing  to  do  was  to  live. 

Now  that  his  future  was  certain,  Augustin  en- 
deavoured to  arrange  his  life  with  a  view  to  his  tran- 
quillity. He  had  no  longer  very  large  ambitions. 
What  he  principally  wanted  to  do  was  to  create  for 
himself  a  nice  little  existence,  peaceful  and  agree- 

175 


176  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

able,  one  might  almost  say,  middle-class.  His 
present  fortune,  although  small,  was  still  enough 
for  that,  and  he  was  in  a  hurry  to  enjoy  it. 

Accordingly,  he  had  not  been  long  in  Milan  ere 
he  sent  for  his  mistress  and  his  son.  He  had  rented 
an  apartment  in  a  house  which  gave  on  a  garden. 
The  owner,  who  did  not  live  there,  allowed  him  the 
use  of  the  whole  house.  A  house,  the  dream  of  the 
sage  !  And  a  garden  in  Virgil's  country  !  Augustin, 
the  professor,  should  have  been  wonderfully  happy. 
His  mother  soon  joined  him.  Gradually  a  whole 
tribe  of  Africans  came  down  on  him,  and  took 
advantage  of  his  hospitality.  Here  was  his  brother, 
Navigius,  his  two  cousins,  Rusticus  and  Lastidianus, 
his  friend  Alypius,  who  could  not  make  up  his  mind 
to  part  from  him,  and  probably  Nebridius,  another 
of  his  Carthage  friends.  Nothing  could  be  more 
in  harmony  with  the  customs  of  the  time.  The 
Rhetorician  to  the  City  of  Milan  had  a  post  which 
would  pass  for  superb  in  the  eyes  of  his  poor  rela- 
tions. He  was  acquainted  with  very  important 
people,  and  had  access  to  the  Imperial  Court,  whence 
favours  and  bounties  came.  Immediately,  the 
family  ran  to  put  themselves  under  his  protection 
and  be  enrolled  beneficiaries,  to  get  what  they  could 
out  of  his  new  fortune  and  credit.  And  then  these 
immigrations  of  Africans  and  Orientals  into  the 
northern  countries  always  come  about  in  the  same 
way.  It  is  enough  if  one  of  them  gets  on  there  : 
he  becomes  immediately  the  drop  of  ink  on  the 
blotting-paper. 

The  most  important  person  in  this  little  African 
phalanstery  was  unquestionably  Monnica,  who  had 
taken  in  hand  the  moral  and  material  control  of 


PLANS   OF   MARRIAGE  177 

the  house.  She  was  not  very  old — not  quite  fifty- 
four — but  she  wanted  to  be  in  her  own  country. 
That  she  should  have  left  it,  and  faced  the  weari- 
ness of  a  long  journey  over  sea  and  land,  she  must 
have  had  very  serious  reasons.  The  poverty  into 
which  she  had  fallen  since  the  death  of  her  husband 
would  not  be  an  adequate  explanation  of  her 
departure  from  her  native  land.  She  had  still  some 
small  property  at  Thagaste  ;  she  could  have  lived 
there.  The  true  motives  of  her  departure  were  of 
an  altogether  different  order.  First  of  all,  she 
passionately  loved  her  son,  to  the  point  that  she 
was  not  able  to  live  away  from  him.  Let  us  recall 
Augustin's  touching  words  :  "  For  she  loved  to 
keep  me  with  her,  as  mothers  are  wont,  yes,  far 
more  than  most  mothers."  Besides  that,  she 
wanted  to  save  him.  She  completely  believed  that 
this  was  her  work  in  the  world. 

Beginning  from  now,  she  is  no  longer  the  widow 
of  Patricius  :  she  is  already  Saint  Monnica.  Living 
like  a  nun,  she  fasted,  prayed,  mortified  her  body. 
By  long  meditating  on  the  Scriptures,  she  had 
developed  within  her  the  sense  of  spiritual  realities, 
so  that  before  long  she  astonished  Augustin  himself. 
She  had  visions  ;  perhaps  she  had  trances.  As  she 
came  over  the  sea  from  Carthage  to  Ostia,  the  ship 
which  carried  her  ran  into  a  wild  gale.  The  danger 
became  extreme,  and  the  sailors  themselves  could 
no  longer  hide  their  fear.  But  Monnica  intrepidly 
encouraged  them.  **  Never  you  fear,  we  shall  arrive 
in  port  safe  and  sound  !  "  God,  she  declared,  had 
promised  her  this. 

If,  in  her  Christian  life,  she  knew  other  minutes 
more  divine,  that  was  truly  the  most  heroic.    Across 


178  SAINT   AUGUSTIN 

Augustin's  calm  narrative,  we  witness  the  scene.  This 
woman  lying  on  the  deck  among  passengers  half 
dead  from  fatigue  and  terror,  suddenly  flings  back 
her  veils,  stands  up  before  the  maddened  sea,  and 
with  a  sudden  flame  gleaming  over  her  pale  face,  she 
cries  to  the  sailors  :  "  What  do  you  fear  ?  We  shall 
get  to  port.  /  a7n  sure  of  it !  "  The  glorious  act 
of  faith  ! 

At  this  solemn  moment,  when  she  saw  death  so 
near,  she  had  a  clear  revelation  of  her  destiny  ; 
she  knew  with  absolute  certainty  that  she  was 
entrusted  with  a  message  for  her  son,  and  that  her 
son  would  receive  this  message,  in  spite  of  all,  in 
spite  of  the  wildness  of  the  sea — aye,  in  spite  of  his 
own  heart. 

When  this  sublime  emotion  had  subsided,  it  left 
with  her  the  conviction  that  sooner  or  later  Augustin 
would  change  his  ways.  He  had  lost  himself,  he 
was  mistaken  about  himself.  This  business  of 
rhetorician  was  unworthy  of  him.  The  Master  of 
the  field  had  chosen  him  to  be  one  of  the  great 
reapers  in  the  time  of  harvest.  For  a  long  while 
Monnica  had  foreseen  the  exceptional  place  that 
Augustin  was  to  take  in  the  Church.  Why  fritter 
away  his  talent  and  intelligence  in  selling  vain 
words,  when  there  were  heresies  to  combat,  the 
Truth  to  make  shine  forth,  when  the  Donatists  were 
capturing  the  African  basilicas  from  the  Catholics  ? 
What,  in  fact,  was  the  most  celebrated  rhetorician 
compared  to  a  bishop — protector  of  cities,  coun- 
sellor of  emperors,  representative  of  God  on  earth  ? 
All  this  might  Augustin  be.  And  he  remained 
stubborn  in  his  error  !  Prayers  and  efforts  must  be 
redoubled  to  draw  him  from  that.     It  was  also  for 


PLANS   OF   MARRIAGE  179 

herself  that  she  struggled,  for  the  dearest  of  her 
hopes  as  a  mother.  To  bear  a  soul  to  Jesus  Christ — 
and  a  chosen  soul  who  would  save  in  his  turn  souls 
without  number — for  this  only  had  she  lived.  And 
so  it  was  that  on  the  deck,  tired  by  the  rolling  of 
the  ship,  drenched  Vjy  the  seas  that  were  breaking 
on  board,  and  hardly  able  to  stand  in  the  teeth  of 
the  wind,  she  cried  out  to  the  sailors  :  "  What  do 
you  fear  ?  We  shall  get  to  port.  I  am  sure  of 
it.  .  .  ." 

At  Milan  she  was  regarded  by  Bishop  Ambrose 
as  a  model  parishioner.  She  never  missed  his  sermons 
and  "  hung  upon  his  lips  as  a  fountain  of  water 
springing  up  to  eternal  life."  And  yet  it  does  not 
appear  that  the  great  bishop  understood  the  mother 
any  better  than  he  did  the  son  :  he  had  not  the 
time.  For  him  Monnica  was  a  worthy  African 
woman,  perhaps  a  little  odd  in  her  devotion,  and 
given  to  many  a  superstitious  practice.  Thus,  she 
continued  to  carry  baskets  of  bread  and  wine  and 
pulse  to  the  tombs  of  the  martyrs,  according  to  the 
use  at  Carthage  and  Thagaste.  When,  carrying 
her  basket,  she  came  to  the  door  of  one  of  the 
Milanese  basilicas,  the  doorkeeper  forbade  her  to 
enter,  saying  that  it  was  against  the  bishop's  orders, 
who  had  solemnly  condemned  such  practices  be- 
cause they  smacked  of  idolatry.  The  moment  she 
learned  that  this  custom  was  prohibited  by  Ambrose, 
Monnica,  very  much  mortified,  submitted  to  take 
away  her  basket,  for  in  her  eyes  Ambrose  was  the 
providential  apostle  who  would  lead  her  son  to 
salvation.  And  yet  it  must  have  grieved  her  to 
give  up  this  old  custom  of  her  country.  Save  for 
the  fear  of  displeasing  the  bishop,  she  would  have 


i8o  SAINT   AUGUSTIN 

kept  it  up.  Ambrose  was  gratified  by  her  obedience, 
her  fervour  and  charity.  When  by  chance  he  met 
the  son,  he  congratulated  him  on  having  such  a 
mother.  Augustin,  who  did  not  yet  despise  human 
praise,  no  doubt  expected  that  Ambrose  would  in 
turn  pay  some  compliments  to  himself.  But 
Ambrose  did  not  praise  him  at  all,  and  perhaps  he 
felt  rather  vexed. 

He  himself,  however,  was  always  very  busy  ;  he 
had  hardly  any  time  to  profit  by  the  pious  exhorta- 
tions of  the  bishop.  His  day  was  filled  by  his  work 
and  his  social  duties.  In  the  morning  he  lectured. 
The  afternoon  went  in  friendly  visits,  or  in  looking 
up  men  of  position  whom  he  applied  to  for  himself 
or  his  relations.  In  the  evening,  he  prepared  to- 
morrow's lecture.  In  spite  of  this  very  full  and 
stirring  life,  which  would  seem  to  satisfy  all  his 
ambitions,  he  could  not  manage  to  stifle  the  cry  of 
his  heart  in  distress.  He  did  not  feel  really  happy. 
In  the  first  place,  it  is  doubtful  whether  he  liked 
Milan  any  better  than  Rome.  He  felt  the  cold  there 
very  much.  The  Milanese  winters  are  very  trying, 
especially  for  a  southerner.  Thick  fogs  rise  from  the 
canals  and  the  marsh  lands  which  surround  the 
city.  The  Alpine  snows  are  very  near.  This 
climate,  damper  and  frostier  even  than  at  Rome, 
did  no  good  to  his  chest.  He  suffered  continually 
from  hoarseness  ;  he  was  obliged  to  interrupt  his 
lectures — a  most  disastrous  necessity  for  a  man 
whose  business  it  is  to  talk.  These  attacks  became 
so  frequent  that  he  was  forced  to  wonder  if  he 
could  keep  on  long  in  this  state.  Already  he  felt 
that  he  might  be  obliged  to  give  up  his  profession. 
Then,  in  those  hours  when  he  lost  heart,  he  flung  to 


PLANS   OF   MARRIAGE  i8i 

the  winds  all  his  youthful  ambitions.  As  a  last 
resort,  the  voiceless  rhetorician  would  take  a  post 
in  one  of  the  administrative  departments  of  the 
Empire.  The  idea  of  being  one  day  a  provincial 
governor  did  not  rouse  an}^  special  repugnance. 
What  a  fall  for  him  !  "  Yes,  but  it  is  the  wisest,  the 
wisest  thing,"  retorted  the  ill- advising  voice,  the  one 
we  are  tempted  to  listen  to  when  we  doubt  ourselves. 

Friendship,  as  always  with  Augustin,  consoled 
him  for  his  hopeless  thoughts.  Near  him  was  "  the 
brother  of  his  heart,"  the  faithful  Alypius,  and  also 
Nebridius,  that  young  man  so  fond  of  metaphysical 
discussions.  Nebridius  had  left  his  rich  estate  in 
the  Carthaginian  suburbs,  and  a  mother  who  loved 
him,  simply  to  live  with  Augustin  in  the  pursuit  of 
truth.  Romanianus  was  also  there,  but  for  a  less 
disinterested  reason.  The  Maecenas  of  Thagaste, 
after  his  ostentatious  expenditure,  found  that  his 
fortune  was  threatened.  A  powerful  enemy,  who 
had  started  a  law-suit  against  him,  worked  to  bring 
about  his  downfall.  Romanianus  had  come  to 
Milan  to  defend  himself  before  the  Emperor,  and  to 
win  the  support  of  influential  personages  about 
the  Court.  And  so  it  came  about  that  he  saw  a  great 
deal  of  Augustin. 

Besides  this  little  band  of  fellow-countrymen, 
the  professor  of  rhetoric  had  some  very  distinguished 
friends  among  the  aristocrac}^  He  was  especially 
intimate  with  that  Manlius  Theodoras  whom  the 
poet  Claudian  celebrates,  and  to  whom  he  himself 
later  on  was  to  dedicate  one  of  his  books.  This  rich 
man,  who  had  been  Proconsul  at  Carthage,  where 
no  doubt  he  had  met  Augustin,  lived  at  this  time 
retired  in  the  country,  dividing   his  leisure  hours 


i82  SAINT   AUGUSTIN 

between  the  study  of  the  Greek  philosophers, 
especially  of  the  Platonists,  and  the  cultivation  of 
his  vine^^ards  and  olive  trees. 

Here,  as  at  Thagaste,  in  these  beautiful  villas 
on  the  shores  of  the  Italian  lakes,  the  son  of  Mon- 
nica  gave  himself  up  once  more  to  the  sweetness  of 
life.  "  I  liked  an  easy  life,"  he  avows  in  all  sim- 
plicity. He  felt  himself  to  be  more  Epicurean  than 
ever.  He  might  have  chosen  Epicureanism  alto- 
gether, if  he  had  not  always  kept  a  fear  of  what  is 
beyond  life.  But  when  he  was  the  guest  of  Manlius 
Theodorus,  fronting  the  dim  blue  mountains  of 
lake  Como,  framed  in  the  high  windows  of  the 
triclinium,  he  did  not  think  much  about  what  is 
beyond  life.  He  said  to  himself  :  "  Why  desire  the 
impossible  ?  So  very  little  is  needed  to  satisfy  a 
human  soul."  The  enervating  contact  of  luxury 
and  comfort  imperceptibly  corrupted  him.  He 
became  like  those  fashionable  people  whom  he 
knew  so  well  how  to  charm  with  his  talk.  Like  the 
fashionable  people  of  all  times,  these  designated 
victims  of  the  Barbarians  built,  with  their  small 
daily  pleasures,  a  rampart  against  all  offensive  or 
saddening  realities,  leaving  the  important  questions 
without  answer,  no  longer  even  asking  them.  And 
they  said  :  "I  have  beautiful  books,  a  well-heated 
house,  well-trained  slaves,  a  delightfully  arranged 
bathroom,  a  comfortable  vehicle  :  life  is  sweet.  I 
don't  wish  for  a  better.  What's  the  use  ?  This 
one  is  good  enough  for  me."  At  the  moment  when 
his  tired  intellect  gave  up  everything,  Augustin  was 
taken  in  the  snare  of  easy  enjoyment,  and  desired  to 
resemble  these  people  at  all  points,  to  be  one  of  them. 
But  to  be  one  of  them  he  must  have  a  higher  post 


PLANS   OF   MARRIAGE  183 

than  a  rhetorician's,  and  chiefly  it  would  be  neces- 
sary to  put  all  the  outside  forms  and  exterior 
respectability  into  his  life  that  the  world  of  fashion 
shews.  Thus,  little  by  little,  he  began  to  think 
seriously  of  marriage. 

His  mistress  was  the  only  obstacle  in  the  way  of 
this  plan.    He  got  rid  of  her. 

That  was  a  real  domestic  drama,  which  he  has 
tried  to  hide  ;  but  it  must  have  been  extremely 
painful  for  him,  to  judge  by  the  laments  which  he 
gives  vent  to,  despite  himself,  in  some  phrases,  very 
brief  and,  as  it  WTre,  ashamed.  In  this  drama 
Monnica  was  certainly  the  leader,  though  it  is  likely 
that  Augustin's  friends  also  played  their  parts.  No 
doubt,  they  objected  to  the  professor  of  rhetoric,  that 
he  was  injuring  his  reputation  as  well  as  his  future  by 
living  thus  publicly  with  a  concubine.  But  Monnica's 
reasons  were  more  forcible  and  of  quite  another  value. 

To  begin  with,  it  is  very  natural  that  she  should 
have  suffered  in  her  maternal  dignity,  as  well  as 
in  her  conscience  as  a  Christian,  by  having  to  put 
up  with  the  company  of  a  stranger  who  was  her 
son's  mistress.  However  large  we  may  suppose  the 
house  where  the  African  tribe  dwelt,  a  certain 
clashing  between  the  guests  was  unavoidable. 
Generally,  disputes  as  to  who  shall  direct  the  domestic 
arrangements  divide  mother-in-law  and  daughter- 
in-law  who  live  under  one  roof.  What  could  be 
Monnica's  feelings  towards  a  woman  who  was  not 
even  a  daughter-in-law  and  was  regarded  by  her  as 
an  intruder  ?  She  did  not  consider  it  worth  while 
to  make  any  attempt  at  regulating  the  entangle- 
ment of  her  son  by  marrying  them  :  this  person 
was  of  far  too  low  a  class.    It  is  all  very  well  to  be  a 


i84  SAINT   AUGUSTIN 

saint,  but  one  does  not  forget  that  one  is  the  widow 
of  a  man  of  curial  rank,  and  that  a  middle-class 
family  with  self-respect  does  not  lower  itself  by 
admitting  the  first-comer  into  its  ranks  by  marriage. 
But  these  were  secondary  considerations  in  her  eyes. 
The  only  one  which  could  have  really  preyed  on 
her  mind  is  that  this  woman  delayed  Augustin's 
conversion.  On  account  of  her,  as  Monnica  saw 
plainly,  he  put  off  his  baptism  indefinitely.  She  was 
the  chain  of  sin,  the  unclean  past  under  whose 
weight  he  stifled.  He  must  be  freed  from  her  as 
soon  as  possible. 

Convinced  therefore  that  such  was  her  bounden 
duty,  she  worked  continually  to  make  him  break 
off.  By  way  of  putting  him  in  some  sort  face  to 
face  with  a  deed  impossible  to  undo,  she  searched 
to  find  him  a  wife,  with  the  fine  eagerness  that 
mothers  usually  put  into  this  kind  of  hunt.  She 
discovered  a  girl  who  filled,  as  they  say,  all  the 
requirements,  and  who  realized  all  the  hopes  of 
Augustin.  She  had  a  fortune  considerable  enough 
not  to  be  a  burthen  on  her  husband.  Her  money, 
added  to  the  professor's  salary,  would  allow  the 
pair  to  live  in  ease  and  comfort.  So  they  were 
betrothed.  In  the  uncertainty  about  all  things  which 
was  Augustin's  state  just  then,  he  allowed  his  mother 
to  work  at  this  marriage.  No  doubt  he  approved, 
and  like  a  good  official  he  thought  it  was  time  for 
him  to  settle  down. 

From  that  moment,  the  separation  became  in- 
evitable. How  did  the  poor  creature  who  had  been 
faithful  to  him  during  so  many  years  feel  at  this 
ignominious  dismissal  ?  What  must  have  been  the 
parting  between  the  child  Adeodatus  and  his  mother  ? 


PLANS   OF   MARRIAGE  185 

How,  indeed,  could  Augustin  consent  to  take  him 
from  her  ?  Here,  again,  he  has  decided  to  keep 
silent  on  this  painful  drama,  from  a  feeling  of  shame 
easy  to  understand.  Of  course,  he  was  no  longer 
strongly  in  love  with  his  mistress,  but  he  was  attached 
to  her  by  some  remains  of  tenderness,  and  by  that 
very  strong  tie  of  pleasure  shared.  He  has  said  it 
in  words  burning  with  regret.  "  When  they  took 
from  my  side,  as  an  obstacle  to  my  marriage,  her 
with  whom  I  had  been  used  for  such  a  long  time  to 
sleep,  my  heart  was  torn  at  the  place  where  it  was 
stuck  to  hers,  and  the  wound  was  bleeding."  The 
phrase  casts  light  while  it  burns.  "  At  the  place 
where  my  heart  stuck  to  hers  " — cor  uhi  adhcBvehat. 
He  acknowledges  then  that  the  union  was  no 
longer  complete,  since  at  many  points  he  had  drawn 
apart.  If  the  soul  of  his  mistress  had  remained  the 
same,  his  had  changed:  however  much  he  might 
still  love  her,  he  was  already  far  from  her. 

Be  that  as  it  will,  she  behaved  splendidly  in  the 
affair — this  forsaken  woman,  this  poor  creature  whom 
they  deemed  unworthy  of  Augustin.  She  was  a 
Christian  ;  perhaps  she  perceived  (for  a  loving 
woman  might  well  have  this  kind  of  second-sight) 
that  it  was  a  question  not  only  of  the  salvation  of  a 
loved  being,  but  of  a  divine  mission  to  which  he 
was  predestined.  She  sacrificed  herself  that  Augustin 
might  be  an  apostle  and  a  saint — a  great  servant  of 
God.  So  she  went  back  to  her  Africa,  and  to  shew 
that  she  pardoned,  if  she  could  not  forget,  she  vowed 
that  she  would  never  know  any  other  man.  "  She 
who  had  slept  "  with  Augustin  could  never  be  the 
wife  of  any  one  else. 

However  low  she  may  have  been  to  begin  with, 


i86  SAINT   AUGUSTIN 

the  unhappy  woman  was  great  at  this  crisis.  Her 
nobihty  of  soul  humiliated  Augustin,  and  Monnica 
herself,  and  punishment  was  not  slow  in  falling  on 
them  both — on  him,  for  letting  himself  be  carried 
away  by  sordid  plans  for  success  in  life,  and  upon  her, 
the  saint,  for  having  been  too  accommodating.  As 
soon  as  his  mistress  was  gone,  Augustin  suffered 
from  being  alone.  "  I  thought  that  I  should  be 
miserable,"  says  he,  "  without  the  embraces  of  a 
woman."  Now  his  promised  bride  was  too  young  : 
two  years  must  pass  before  he  could  marry  her. 
How  could  he  control  himself  till  then  ?  Augustin 
did  not  hesitate  :    he  found  another  mistress. 

There  was  Monnica's  punishment,  cruelly  de- 
ceived in  her  pious  intentions.  In  vain  did  she 
hope  a  great  deal  of  good  from  this  approaching 
marriage  :  the  silence  of  God  shewed  her  that  she 
was  on  the  wrong  track.  She  begged  for  a  vision, 
some  sign  which  would  reveal  to  her  how  this  new- 
planned  marriage  would  turn  out.  Her  prayer  was 
not  heard. 

"  Meanwhile,"  says  Augustin,  "  my  sins  were 
being  multiplied."  But  he  did  not  limit  himself 
to  his  own  sins  :  he  led  others  into  temptation. 
Even  in  matrimonial  matters,  he  felt  the  need  of 
making  proselytes.  So  he  fell  upon  the  worthy 
Alypius.  He,  to  be  sure,  guarded  himself  chastely 
from  women,  although  in  the  outset  of  his  j^outh, 
to  be  like  everybody  else,  he  had  tried  pleasure  with 
women;  but  he  had  found  that  it  did  not  suit  his 
taste.  However,  Augustin  put  conjugal  delights 
before  him  with  so  much  heat,  that  he  too  began 
to  turn  his  thoughts  that  way,  "  not  that  he  was 
overcome   by   the    desire    of   pleasure,    hut   out   of 


PLANS   OF   MARRIAGE  187 

curiosity."  For  Alypius,  marriage  would  be  a  sort 
of  philosophic  and  sentimental  experience. 

Here  are  quite  modern  expressions  to  translate 
very  old  conditions  of  soul.  The  fact  is,  that  these 
young  men,  Augustin's  friends  and  Augustin  him- 
self, were  startlingly  like  those  of  a  generation 
already  left  behind,  alas  !  who  will  probably  keep  in 
history  the  presumptuous  name  they  gave  them- 
selves :    The  Intellectuals. 

Like  us,  these  young  Latins  of  Africa,  pupils  of 
the  rhetoricians  and  the  pagan  philosophers,  be- 
lieved in  hardly  anything  but  ideas.  All  but  ready 
to  affirm  that  Truth  is  not  to  be  come  at,  they 
thought,  just  the  same,  that  a  vain  hunt  after 
it  was  a  glorious  risk  to  run,  or,  at  the  very  least, 
an  exciting  game.  For  them  this  game  made  the 
whole  dignity  and  value  of  life.  Although  they  had 
spasms  of  worldly  ambition,  they  really  despised 
whatever  was  not  pure  speculation.  In  their  eyes, 
the  world  was  ugly ;  action  degrading.  They 
barred  themselves  within  the  ideal  garden  of  the 
sage,  "  the  philosopher's  corner,"  as  they  called  it, 
and  jealously  they  stopped  up  all  the  holes  through 
which  the  painful  reality  might  have  crept  through 
to  them.  But  where  they  differed  from  us,  is  that 
they  had  much  less  dryness  of  soul,  with  every  bit  as 
much  pedantry — but  such  ingenuous  pedantry  ! 
That's  what  saved  them — their  generosity  of  soul, 
the  youth  of  their  hearts.  They  loved  each  other, 
and  they  ended  by  growing  fond  of  life  and  getting 
in  contact  with  it  again.  Nebridius  journeyed 
from  Carthage  to  Milan,  abandoning  his  mother  and 
family,  neglecting  considerable  interests,  not  only 
to  talk  philosophy  with  Augustin,  but  to  live  with 


i88  SAINT   AUGUSTIN 

him  as  a  friend.  From  this  moment  they  might 
have  been  putting  in  practice  those  words  of  the 
Psalm,  which  Augustin  ere  long  will  be  explaining 
to  his  monks  with  such  tender  eloquence  :  "  Behold, 
how  good  and  how  pleasant  it  is  for  brethren  to 
dwell  together  in  unity  !  " 

This  is  not  baseless  hypothesis  :  they  had  really 
a  plan  for  establishing  a  kind  of  lay  monastery, 
where  the  sole  rule  would  be  the  search  after  Truth 
and  the  happy  life.  There  would  be  about  a  dozen 
solitaries.  They  would  make  a  common  stock  of 
what  means  they  possessed.  The  richest,  and 
among  these  Romanianus,  promised  to  devote  their 
whole  fortune  to  the  community.  But  the  recollec- 
tion of  their  wives  brought  this  naive  plan  to  nothing. 
They  had  neglected  to  ask  the  opinions  of  their 
wives,  and  if  these,  as  was  likely,  should  refuse  to 
enter  the  convents  with  their  husbands,  the  married 
men  could  not  face  the  scheme  of  living  without 
them.  Augustin  especially,  who  was  on  the  point 
of  starting  a  new  connection,  declared  that  he 
would  never  find  the  courage  for  it.  He  had  also 
forgotten  that  he  had  many  dependents  :  his  whole 
family  lived  on  him.  Could  he  leave  his  mother, 
his  son,  his  brother,  and  his  cousins  ? 

In  company  with  Alypius  and  Nebridius,  he 
sincerely  lamented  that  this  fair  dream  of  coenobite 
life  was  impracticable.  "  We  were  three  famishing 
mouths,"  he  says,  "  complaining  of  our  distress  one 
to  another,  and  waiting  upon  Thee  that  Thou 
mightest  give  us  our  meat  in  due  season.  And  in 
all  the  bitterness  that  Thy  mercy  put  into  our 
worldly  pursuits,  we  sought  the  reason  why  we 
suffered  ;    and  all  was  darkness.     Then  we  turned 


PLANS   OF   MARRIAGE  189 

to  each  other  shuddering,  and  asked  :    '  How  much 
longer  can  this  last  ?  '  .  .  ." 

One  day,  a  slight  commonplace  fact  which  they 
happened  upon  brought  home  to  them  still  more 
cruelly  their  intellectual  poverty.  Augustin,  in  his 
official  position  as  municipal  orator,  had  just  de- 
hvered  the  official  panegyric  of  the  Emperor.  The 
new  year  was  opening  :  the  whole  city  was  given 
over  to  mirth.  And  yet  he  was  cast  down,  knowing 
well  that  he  had  just  uttered  many  an  untruth,  and 
chiefly  because  he  despaired  of  ever  being  happy. 
His  friends  were  walking  with  him.  Suddenly, 
as  they  crossed  the  street,  they  came  upon  a  beggar, 
quite  drunk,  who  was  indulging  in  the  j  oiliest 
pranks.  So  there  was  a  happ}^  man  !  A  few  pence 
had  been  enough  to  give  him  perfect  fehcity,  whereas 
they,  the  philosophers,  despite  the  greatest  efforts 
and  all  their  knowledge,  could  not  manage  to  win 
happiness.  No  doubt,  as  soon  as  the  drunkard 
grew  sober,  he  would  be  more  wretched  than  before. 
What  matters  that,  if  this  poor  joy — yes,  though  it 
be  an  illusion — can  so  much  cheer  a  poor  creature, 
thus  raise  him  so  far  above  himself !  That  minute,  at 
least,  he  shall  have  lived  in  full  bhss.  And  to  Augus- 
tin came  the  temptation  to  do  as  the  beggar-man,  to 
throw  overboard  his  philosophical  lumber  and  set 
himself  simply  to  live  without  afterthoughts,  since 
life  is  sometimes  good. 

But  an  instinct,  stronger  than  the  instinct  of 
pleasure,  said  to  him  :  "  There  is  something  else  I — 
Suppose  that  were  true  ? — Perhaps  you  might  be 
able  to  find  out."  This  thought  tormented  him 
unceasingly.  Now  eager,  now  disheartened,  he  set 
about  trying  to  find  the  "  something  else." 


THE   CHRIST   IN   THE   GARDEN 

1WAS  tired  of  devouring  time  and  of  being 
devoured  by  it."  The  whole  moral  crisis 
that  Augustin  is  about  to  undergo  might  be  summed 
up  in  these  few  words  so  concentrated  and  so  strong. 
No  more  to  scatter  himself  among  the  multitude  of 
vain  things,  no  more  to  let  himself  flow  along  with 
the  minutes  as  they  flowed  ;  but  to  pull  himself 
together,  to  escape  from  the  rout  so  as  to  establish 
himself  upon  the  incorruptible  and  eternal,  to 
break  the  chains  of  the  old  slave  he  continues  to 
be  so  as  to  blossom  forth  in  liberty,  in  thought,  in 
love — that  is  the  salvation  he  longs  for.  If  it  be 
not  yet  the  Christian  salvation,  he  is  on  the  road 
which  leads  to  that. 

One  might  amuse  oneself  by  drawing  a  kind  of 
ideal  map-route  of  his  conversion,  and  fastening 
into  one  solid  chain  the  reasons  which  made  him 
emerge  at  the  act  of  faith  :  he  himself  perhaps,  in 
his  Confessions,  has  given  way  too  much  to  this 
inclination.  In  reality,  conversion  is  an  interior 
fact,  and  (let  us  repeat  it)  a  divine  fact,  which  is 
independent  of  all  control  by  the  reason.  Before 
it  breaks  into  light,  there  is  a  long  preparation  in 
that  dark  region  of  the  soul  which  to-day  is  called 
the  subconscious.  Now  nobody  has  more  lived  his 
ideas  than  did  Augustin  at   this  time  of  his  life. 

190 


THE  CHRIST   IN   THE   GARDEN       191 

He  took  them,  left  them,  took  them  up  again,  per- 
sisted in  his  desperate  effort.  They  reflect  in  their 
disorder  his  variable  soul,  and  the  misgivings  which 
troubled  it  to  its  depths.  And  yet  it  cannot  be  that 
this  interior  fact  should  be  in  violent  contradiction 
with  logic.  The  head  ought  not  to  hinder  the 
heart.  With  the  future  believer,  a  parallel  work 
goes  on  in  the  feelings  and  in  the  thought.  If  we 
are  not  able  to  reproduce  the  marches  and 
counter-marches,  or  follow  their  repeatedly  broken 
line,  we  can  at  least  shew  the  main  halting- 
places. 

Let  us  recall  Augustin's  state  of  mind  when  he 
came  to  Milan.  He  was  a  sceptic,  the  kind  of 
sceptic  who  regards  as  useless  all  speculation  upon 
the  origin  of  things,  and  for  whom  cognition  is  but 
an  approximation  of  the  true.  Vaguely  deist,  he 
saw  in  Jesus  Christ  only  a  wise  man  among  the 
wise.  He  believed  in  God  and  the  providences  of 
God,  which  amounts  to  this  :  That  although 
materialist  by  tendency,  he  admitted  the  divine 
interference  in  human  affairs — the  miracle.  This 
is  an  important  point  which  differentiates  him  from 
modern  materialists. 

Next,  he  listened  to  the  preaching  of  Ambrose. 
The  Bible  no  longer  seemed  to  him  absurd  or  at 
variance  with  a  moral  scheme.  Ambrose's  exegesis, 
half  allegorical,  half  historic,  might  be  accepted, 
taken  altogether,  by  self-respecting  minds.  But 
what,  above  all,  struck  Augustin  in  the  Scriptures, 
was  the  wisdom,  the  practical  efficiency.  Those 
who  lived  by  the  Christian  rule  were  not  only 
happy  people,  but,  as  Pascal  would  say,  good  sons, 
good  husbands,   good  fathers,   good   citizens.     He 


192  SAINT   AUGUSTIN 

began  to  suspect  that  this  hfe  here  below  is  bearable 
and  has  a  meaning  only  when  it  is  fastened  to  the 
life  on  high.  Even  as  for  nations  glory  is  daily 
bread,  so  for  the  individual  the  sacrifice  to  some- 
thing which  is  beyond  the  world  is  the  only  way  of 
living  in  the  world. 

So,  little  by  little,  Augustin  corrected  the  false 
notions  that  the  Manichees  had  filled  him  with 
about  Catholicism.  He  acknowledged  that  in  at- 
tacking it  he  had  "  been  barking  against  the  vain 
imaginations  of  carnal  thoughts."  Still,  he  found 
great  difficulty  in  getting  free  of  all  his  Manichean 
prejudices.  The  problem  of  Evil  remained  in- 
explicable for  him,  apart  from  Manichee  teachings. 
God  could  not  be  the  author  of  evil.  This  truth 
admitted,  he  went  on  from  it  to  think,  against 
his  former  masters,  that  nothing  is  bad  in 
itself — bad  because  it  has  within  it  a  corrupting 
principle.  On  the  contrary,  all  things  are  good, 
though  in  varying  degrees.  The  apparent  defects  of 
creation,  perceived  by  our  senses,  blend  into  the 
harmony  of  the  whole.  The  toad  and  the  viper 
have  their  place  in  the  operation  of  a  perfectly 
arranged  world.  But  physical  ill  is  not  the  only 
ill ;  there  is  also  the  evil  that  we  do  and  the  evil 
that  others  do  us.  Crime  and  pain  are  terrible 
arguments  against  God.  Now  the  Christians  hold 
that  the  first  is  the  product  solely  of  the  human  will, 
of  liberty  corrupted  by  original  sin,  and  that  the 
other  is  permitted  by  God  as  a  means  of  purifying 
souls.  Of  course,  this  was  a  solution,  but  it  implied 
a  belief  in  the  dogmas  of  the  Fall  and  of  the  Re- 
demption. Augustin  did  not  accept  them  yet.  He 
was  too  proud  to  recognize  an  impaired  will  and 


THE  CHRIST   IN   THE   GARDEN       193 

the  need  of  a  Saviour.     "  My  puffed-out  face,"  he 
says,  "  closed  up  my  eyes." 

Nevertheless  he  had  taken  a  great  step  in  rejecting 
the  fundamental  dogma  of  Manicheeism — the  double 
Principle  of  good  and  evil.  Henceforth  for  Augustin 
there  exists  only  one  Principle,  unique  and  incor- 
ruptible— the  Good,  which  is  God.  But  his  view  of 
this  divine  substance  is  still  quite  materialistic,  to 
such  an  extent  is  he  governed  by  his  senses.  In  his 
thought,  it  is  corporeal,  spatial,  and  infinite.  He 
pictures  it  as  a  kind  of  limitless  sea,  wherein  is  a  huge 
sponge  bathing  the  world  that  it  pervades  through- 
out. ...  He  was  at  this  point,  when  one  of  his 
acquaintances,  "  a  man  puffed  up  with  immense 
vanity,"  gave  him  some  of  the  Dialogues  of  Plato, 
translated  into  Latin  by  the  famous  rhetorician 
Victorinus  Afer.  It  is  worth  noting,  as  we  pass, 
that  Augustin,  now  thirty-two  years  old,  a  rheto- 
rician by  profession  and  a  philosopher  by  taste, 
had  not  yet  read  Plato.  This  is  yet  another  proof 
to  what  extent  the  instruction  of  the  ancients  was 
oral,  resembling  in  this  the  Mussulmans'  instruc- 
tion of  to-day.  Up  to  now,  he  had  only  known 
Plato  by  hearsay.  He  read  him,  and  it  was  as  a 
revelation.  He  learned  that  a  reality  could  exist 
without  diffusion  through  space.  He  saw  God  as 
unextended  and  yet  infinite.  The  sense  of  the 
divine  Soul  was  given  to  him.  Then  the  primordial 
necessity  of  the  Mediator  or  Word  was  borne  in 
upon  his  mind.  It  is  the  Word  which  has  created 
the  world.  It  is  through  the  Word  that  the  world, 
and  God,  and  all  things,  including  ourselves,  become 
comprehensible  to  us.  What  an  astonishment  ! 
Plato    corresponded    with    St.    John !      ''In    the 


194  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

beginning  was  the  Word  " — in  principio  erat  verbum 
— said  the  fourth  Gospel.  But  it  was  not  only  an 
Evangelist  that  Augustin  discovered  in  the  Platonist 
dialogues,  it  was  almost  all  the  essential  part  of  the 
doctrine  of  Christ.  He  saw  plainly  the  profound 
differences,  but  for  the  moment  he  was  struck  by 
the  resemblances,  and  they  carried  him  away.  What 
delighted  him,  first  of  all,  is  the  beauty  of  the  world, 
constructed  after  His  own  likeness  by  the  Demiur- 
gus.  God  is  Beauty  ;  the  world  is  fair  as  He  who 
made  it.  This  metaphysical  vision  entranced  Augus- 
tin ;  his  whole  heart  leaped  towards  this  ineffably 
beautiful  Divinity.  Carried  away  by  enthusiasm 
he  cries  :  "I  marvelled  to  find  that  now  I  loved 
Thee,  O  my  God,  and  not  a  phantasm  in  Thy  stead. 
If  I  was  not  yet  in  a  state  to  enjoy  Thee,  /  was 
swept  up  to  Thee  by  Thy  beauty." 

But  such  an  abandonment  could  not  endure  : 
"  I  was  not  yet  in  a  state  to  enjoy  Thee."  There 
is  Augustin's  main  objection  to  Platonism.  He 
felt  that  instead  of  touching  God,  of  enjoying  Him, 
he  would  be  held  by  purely  mental  conceptions, 
that  he  would  be  always  losing  his  way  among  the 
phantasmagoria  of  idealism.  What  was  the  use  of 
giving  up  the  illusory  realities  of  the  senses,  if  it 
were  not  to  get  hold  of  more  solid  realities  ?  Though 
his  intelligence,  his  poet's  imagination,  might  be 
attracted  by  the  glamour  of  Platonism,  his  heart 
was  not  satisfied.  "It  is  one  thing,"  he  says, 
"  from  some  wooded  height  to  behold  the  land  of 
peace,  another  thing  to  march  thither  along  the 
high  road." 

St.  Paul  it  was  who  shewed  him  this  road.  He 
began  to  read  the  Epistles  carefully,  and  the  more 


THE   CHRIST  IN   THE   GARDEN       195 

he  read  of  them  the  more  he  became  aware  of  the 
abyss  which  separates  philosophy  from  wisdom — 
the  one  which  marshals  the  ideas  of  things,  the  other 
which,  ignoring  ideas,  leads  right  up  to  the  divine 
realities  whereon  the  others  are  suspended.  The 
Apostle  taught  Augustin  that  it  was  not  enough  to 
get  a  glimpse  of  God  through  the  crystal  of  con- 
cepts, but  that  it  is  necessary  to  be  united  to  Him 
in  spirit  and  in  truth — to  possess  and  enjoy  Him. 
And  to  unite  itself  to  this  Good,  the  soul  must  get 
itself  into  a  fit  state  for  such  a  union,  purify  and 
cure  itself  of  all  its  fleshly  maladies,  descry  its  place 
in  the  world  and  hold  to  it.  Necessity  of  repentance, 
of  humility,  of  the  contrite  and  humble  heart.  Only 
the  contrite  and  humble  heart  shall  see  God.  "  The 
broken  heart  shall  be  cured,"  says  the  Scripture, 
"  but  the  heart  of  the  proud  man  shall  be  shattered." 
So  Augustin,  the  intellectual,  had  to  change  his 
methods,  and  he  felt  that  this  change  was  right.  If 
the  writer  who  wants  to  write  beautiful  things  ought 
to  put  himself  beforehand  into  some  sort  of  a  state 
of  grace,  wherein  not  only  vile  actions,  but  unworthy 
thoughts  become  impossible,  the  Christian,  in  like 
manner,  must  cleanse  and  prepare  his  inward  eye  to 
perceive  the  divine  verities,  Augustin  grasped  this 
thought  in  reading  St.  Paul.  But  what,  above  all, 
appealed  to  him  in  the  Epistles,  was  their  paternal 
voice,  the  mildness  and  graciousness  hidden  beneath 
the  uncultivated  roughness  of  the  phrases.  He  was 
charmed  by  this.  How  different  from  the  philos- 
ophers !  **  Those  celebrated  pages  have  no  trace 
of  the  pious  soul,  the  tears  of  repentance,  nor  of  Thy 
sacrifice,  O  my  God,  nor  of  the  troubled  spirit.  .  .  . 
No  one  there  hearkened  to  the  Christ  that  calleth, 


196  SAINT   AUGUSTIN 

'  Come  unto  Me,  all  ye  that  labour  !  '  They  think 
it  scorn  to  learn  from  Him,  because  He  is  meek  and 
lowly  of  heart.  For  Thou  hast  hidden  these  things 
from  the  wise  and  prudent,  and  hast  revealed  them 
unto  babes." 

But  it  is  not  much  to  bend  :  what  is,  above  all, 
requisite  for  him  is  to  get  rid  of  his  passions.  Now 
Augustin's  passions  were  old  friends.  How  could 
he  part  with  them  ?  He  lacked  courage  for  this 
heroic  treatment.  Just  think  of  what  a  young 
man  of  thirty-two  is.  He  is  always  thinking  of 
women.  Lust  holds  him  by  the  entanglements  of 
habit,  and  he  takes  pleasure  in  the  impurity  of  his 
heart.  When,  jdelding  to  the  exhortations  of  the 
Apostle,  he  tried  to  shape  his  conduct  to  his  new 
way  of  thinking,  the  old  friends  trooped  to  beg  of 
him  not  to  do  anything  of  the  kind.  "  They  pulled 
me,"  he  says,  "  by  the  coat  of  my  flesh,  and  they 
murmured  in  my  ear — What,  are  you  leaving  us  ? 
Shall  we  be  no  more  with  you,  for  ever  ?  Non 
erimus  tecum  ultra  in  aeternum  ?  .  .  .  And  from 
that  instant,  the  thing  you  well  know,  and  still 
another  thing,  will  be  forbidden  you  for  ever — 
for  eternity.  ..." 

Eternity  !  Dread  word.  Augustin  shook  with 
fear.  Then,  calming  himself,  he  said  to  them  :  "I 
know  you  ;  I  know  you  too  well !  You  are  Desire 
without  hope,  the  Gulf  without  soundings  that 
nothing  can  fill  up.  I  have  suffered  enough  because 
of  you."  And  the  anguished  dialogue  continued  : 
"  What  matters  that  !  If  the  only  possible 
happiness  for  you  is  to  suffer  on  our  account,  to  fling 
your  body  into  the  voracious  gulf,  without  end, 
without  hope  !  " — "  Let  cowards  act  so  !  .  .  .  For 


THE   CHRIST   IN   THE   GARDEN       197 

me  there  is  another  happiness  than  yours.  There  is 
something  else  :  I  am  certain."  Then  the  friends, 
put  a  Httle  out  of  countenance  by  this  convinced 
tone,  muttered  in  a  lower  voice  :  "  Still,  just  sup- 
pose you  are  losing  this  wretched  pleasure  for  a 
phantasm  still  more  empty.  .  .  .  Besides,  you  are 
mistaken  about  your  strength.  You  cannot — no, 
you  never  can  exist  without  us."  They  had  touched 
the  galling  spot  :  Augustin  knew  his  weakness  only 
too  well.  And  his  burning  imagination  presented 
to  him  with  extraordinary  lucidity  these  pleasures 
which  he  could  not  do  without.  They  were  not  only 
embracements,  but  also  those  trifles,  those  super- 
fluous nothings,  "  those  light  pleasantnesses  which 
make  us  fond  of  life."  The  perfidious  old  friends 
continued  to  whisper  :  ''  Wait  a  bit  yet  !  The 
things  you  despise  have  a  charm  of  their  own  ; 
they  bring  even  no  small  sweetness.  You  ought  not 
to  cut  yourself  off  light-heartedly,  for  it  would 
be  shameful  to  return  to  them  afterwards."  He 
passed  in  review  all  the  things  he  was  going  to  give 
up  ;  he  saw  them  shine  before  him  tinted  in  the 
most  alluring  colours  :  gaming,  elaborate  entertain- 
ments, music,  song,  perfumes,  books,  poetry,  flowers, 
the  coolness  of  forests  (he  remembered  the  woods 
about  Thagaste,  and  his  hunting  days  with  Romani- 
anus) — in  a  word,  all  that  he  had  ever  cared  about, 
even  to  "  that  freshness  of  the  light,  so  kind  to 
human  eyes." 

Augustin  was  not  able  to  decide  in  this  conflict 
between  temptation  and  the  decree  of  his  conscience, 
and  he  became  desperate.  His  will,  enfeebled  by  sin, 
was  unable  to  struggle  against  itself.  And  so  he  con- 
tinued)to  endure  life  and  to  be  "devoured  by  time." 


igS  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

The  life  of  that  particular  period,  if  it  was  en- 
durable for  quiet  folk  who  were  careful  to  have 
nothing  to  do  with  politics — this  life  of  the  Empire 
near  its  end,  could  be  nothing  but  a  scandalous 
spectacle  for  an  honest-minded  and  high-souled 
man  such  as  Augustin.  It  ought  to  have  disgusted 
him  at  once  with  remaining  in  the  world.  At  Milan, 
connected  as  he  was  with  the  Court,  he  was  in  a 
good  position  to  see  how  much  baseness  and  ferocity 
may  spring  from  human  avarice  and  ambition.  If 
the  present  was  hideous,  the  future  promised  to  be 
sinister.  The  Roman  Empire  no  longer  existed  save 
in  name.  Foreigners,  come  from  all  the  countries 
of  the  Mediterranean,  plundered  the  provinces 
under  its  authority.  The  army  was  almost  al- 
together in  the  hands  of  the  Barbarians.  They 
were  Gothic  tribunes  who  kept  order  outside  the 
basilica  where  Ambrose  had  closed  himself  in  with 
his  people  to  withstand  the  order  of  the  Empress 
Justina,  who  wished  to  hand  over  this  church  to  the 
Arians.  Levantine  eunuchs  domineered  over  the 
exchequer-clerks  in  the  palace,  and  officials  of  all 
ranks.  All  these  people  plundered  where  they  could. 
The  Empire,  even  grown  feeble,  was  always  an  ex- 
cellent machine  to  rule  men  and  extract  gold  from 
nations.  Accordingly,  ambitious  men  and  adven- 
turers, wherever  they  came  from,  tried  for  the 
Purple:  it  was  still  worth  risking  one's  skin  for. 
Even  more  than  the  patriots  (and  there  were  still  some 
very  energetic  men  of  this  sort  who  were  overcome 
with  grief  at  the  state  of  things) ,  the  men  of  rapine  and 
violence  were  interested  in  maintaining  the  Empire. 
The  Barbarians  themselves  desired  to  be  included, 
so  that  they  might  pillage  it  with  more  impunity. 


THE   CHRIST  IN  THE   GARDEN       199 

As  for  the  emperors,  even  sincere  Christians,  they 
were  obhged  to  become  abominable  tj^ants  to  defend 
their  constantly  threatened  lives.  Never  were  exe- 
cutions more  frequent  or  more  cruel  than  at  this 
time.  At  Milan  they  might  have  shewn  Augustin, 
hard  by  the  Imperial  sleeping  apartments,  the  cave 
where  the  preceding  Emperor,  choleric  Valentinian, 
kept  two  bears,  "  Bit  of  Gold  "  and  "  Innocence," 
who  were  his  rapid  executioners.  He  fed  them  with 
the  flesh  of  those  condemned  to  die.  Possibly 
"  Bit  of  Gold  "  was  still  living.  "  Innocence  " — 
observe  the  atrocious  irony  of  this  name — had  been 
restored  to  the  liberty  of  her  native  forests,  as  a 
reward  for  her  good  and  loyal  services. 

Was  Augustin,  who  still  thought  of  becoming  an 
official,  going  to  mix  in  with  this  lot  of  swindlers, 
assassins,  and  brute  beasts  ?  As  he  studied  them 
near  at  hand,  he  felt  his  goodwill  grow  weak.  Like 
all  those  who  belong  to  worn-out  generations,  he 
must  have  been  disgusted  with  action  and  the 
villainies  it  involves.  Just  before  great  catastrophes, 
or  just  after,  there  is  an  epidemic  of  black  pessimism 
which  freezes  delicate  souls.  Besides,  he  was  ill — 
a  favourable  circumstance  for  a  disappointed  man 
if  he  entertains  thoughts  of  giving  up  the  world. 
In  the  fogs  of  Milan  his  chest  and  throat  became 
worse  and  worse.  And  then  it  is  likely  enough  that 
he  was  not  succeeding  better  as  rhetorician  than  he 
had  at  Rome.  It  was  a  kind  of  fatality  for  all 
Africans.  However  great  their  reputation  in  their 
own  country,  that  was  the  end  of  it  as  soon  as  they 
crossed  the  sea.  Apuleius,  the  great  man  of  Carth- 
age, had  tried  the  experiment  to  his  cost.  They  had 
made  fun  of  his  guttural  Carthaginian  pronuncia- 


200  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

tion.  The  same  kind  of  thing  happened  to  Angustin. 
The  Milanese  turned  his  African  accent  into  ridicule. 
He  even  found  among  them  certain  purists  who 
discovered  solecisms  in  his  phrases. 

But  these  scratches  at  his  self-respect,  this  in- 
creasing disgust  of  men  and  things,  were  small 
matters  compared  to  what  was  going  on  within  him. 
Augustin  had  a  sick  soul.  The  forebodings  he 
had  always  been  subject  to  were  now  become  the 
suffering  of  every  moment.  At  certain  times  he 
was  assailed  by  those  great  waves  of  sadness  which 
unfurl  all  of  a  sudden  from  the  depths  of  the  un- 
known. In  such  minutes  we  believe  that  the  whole 
world  is  hurling  itself  against  us.  The  great  wave 
rolled  him  over  ;  he  got  up  again  all  wounded. 
And  he  felt  stretch  forth  in  him  a  new  will  which 
was  not  his  own,  under  which  the  other,  the  will 
to  sin,  struggled.  It  was  like  the  approach  of  an 
invisible  being  whose  contact  overcame  him  with 
an  anguish  which  was  full  of  pleasure.  This  being 
wanted  to  open  out  within  him,  but  the  weight 
of  his  old  sins  prevented.  Then  his  soul  cried 
out  in  Dain. 

In  those  moments,  what  a  relief  it  w^as  to  let 
himself  float  on  the  canticles  of  the  Church  !  The 
liturgical  chants  were  then  something  new  in  the 
West.  It  was  in  the  very  year  we  are  dealing  with 
that  St.  Ambrose  started  the  custom  in  the  Milanese 
basilicas. 

The  childhood  of  our  hymns  !  One  cannot  think 
about  that  without  being  moved.  One  envies 
Augustin  for  having  heard  them  in  their  spring 
freshness. '•*; These  lovely  musics,  which  were  to 
sound   during   so   many   centuries,   and    still   soar 


THE   CHRIST   IN   THE   GARDEN       201 

against  the  vaults  of  cathedrals,  were  leaving  the 
nest  for  the  first  time.  We  cannot  think  that  a 
day  will  come  when  they  will  fold  their  wings  and 
fall  silent.  Since  human  bodies,  temples  of  the 
Holy  Ghost,  will  live  again  in  glory,  one  would 
like  to  believe  with  Dante  that  the  hymns,  temples 
of  the  Word,  are  likewise  immortal,  and  that  they 
will  still  be  heard  in  the  everlasting.  Doubtless  in 
the  twilight  glens  of  Purgatory  the  bewailing  souls 
continue  to  sing  the  Te  lucis  ante  terminum,  even  as 
in  the  star-circles,  where  the  Blessed  move  ever, 
will  always  leap  up  the  triumphant  notes  of  the 
Magnificat.  .  .  . 

Even  on  those  who  have  lost  the  faith,  the  power 
of  these  hymns  is  irresistible.  "  If  you  knew,"  said 
Renan,  "  the  charm  that  the  Barbarian  magicians 
knew  how  to  put  into  their  canticles.  When  I  remem- 
ber them,  my  heart  melts."  The  heart  of  Augustin, 
who  had  not  yet  the  faith,  melted  too  in  hearing 
them  :  "  How  I  have  cried,  vay  God,  over  the 
hymns  and  canticles  when  the  sweet  sound  of  the 
music  of  Thy  Church  thrilled  my  soul  !  As  the 
music  flowed  into  my  ears,  and  Thy  truth  trickled 
into  my  heart,  the  tide  of  devotion  swelled  high 
within  me,  and  the  tears  ran  down,  and  there  was 
gladness  in  those  tears."  His  heart  cast  off  its 
heaviness,  while  his  mind  was  shaken  by  the  heavenly 
music.  x\ugustin  loved  music  passionately.  At  this 
time  he  conceived  God  as  the  Great  Musician  of 
the  spheres  ;  and  soon  he  will  write  that  "  we  are 
a  strophe  in  a  poem."  At  the  same  time,  the 
vivid  and  lightning  figures  of  the  Psalms,  sweeping 
over  the  insipid  metaphors  of  the  rhetoric  which 
encumbered  his  memory,  awoke  in  the  depths  of 


202  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

him  his  wild  African  imagination  and  sent  him 
soaring.  And  then  the  affectionate  note,  the 
plaint  in  those  sacred  songs  :  Deus,  Deus  mens ! — 
"  O  God  !  O  my  God  !  "  The  Divinity  was  no 
longer  a  cold  abstraction,  a  phantom  that  with- 
drew into  an  unapproachable  infinite  ;  He  became 
the  actual  possession  of  the  loving  soul.  He  leant 
over  His  poor  scarred  creature,  took  him  in  His 
arms,  and  comforted  him  like  a  kind  father. 

Augustin  wept  with  tenderness  and  ecstasy,  but 
also  with  despair.  He  wept  upon  himself.  He 
saw  that  he  had  not  the  courage  to  be  happy  with 
the  only  possible  happiness.  What,  indeed,  was  he 
seeking,  unless  it  were  to  capture  this  "  blessed  life  " 
which  he  had  pursued  so  long  ?  What  he  had  tried 
to  get  out  of  all  his  loves  was  the  complete  gift  of 
his  soul — to  realize  himself  completely.  Now,  this 
completeness  of  self  is  only  in  God — in  Deo  salutari 
meo.  The  souls  we  have  wounded  are  in  unison  with 
us,  and  with  themselves,  only  in  God.  .  .  .  And  the 
sweet  Christian  symbolism  invited  him  with  its  most 
enticing  images :  the  Shades  of  Paradise  ;  the 
Fountain  of  Living  Water  ;  the  Repose  in  the  Lord 
God  ;  the  green  Branch  of  the  Dove,  harbinger  of 
peace.  .  .  .  But  the  passions  still  resisted.  "  To- 
morrow !  Wait  a  little  yet  !  Shall  we  be  no  more 
with  you,  for  ever  ?  No7i  erimus  tecum  ultra  in 
aeiernum  ?  ..."  What  a  dismal  sound  in  these 
syllables,  and  how  terrifying  for  a  timid  soul !  They 
fell,  heavy  as  bronze,  on  the  soul  of  Augustin. 

An  end  had  to  be  put  to  it  somehow.  What  was 
needed  was  some  one  who  would  force  him  out  of 
his  indecision.  Instinctively,  led  by  that  mysterious 
will  which  he  felt  had  arisen  within  him,  he  went 


THE  CHRIST   IN   THE  GARDEN       203 

to  see,  and  consult  in  his  distress,  an  old  priest 
named  Simplicianus,  who  had  converted  or  directed 
Bishop  Ambrose  in  his  young  days.  No  doubt 
Augustin  spoke  to  him  of  what  he  had  lately  been 
reading,  and  particularly  of  his  Platonist  studies, 
and  of  all  the  efforts  he  made  to  enter  the  com- 
munion of  Christ.  He  acknowledged  that  he  was 
convinced,  but  he  could  not  bend  to  the  practice  of 
the  Christian  life.  Then,  very  skilfully,  as  one  art- 
ful in  differentiating  souls,  perceiving  that  vanity 
was  not  yet  dead  in  Augustin,  Simplicianus  offered 
him  as  an  example  the  very  translator  of  those 
Platonic  books  which  he  had  just  been  reading  so 
enthusiastically — that  famous  Victorinus  Afer,  that 
orator  so  learned  and  admired,  who  had  his  statue 
in  the  Roman  Forum.  Because  of  some  remains  of 
philosophical  pride,  and  also  from  fear  of  offending 
his  friends  among  the  Roman  aristocracy,  who  were 
still  almost  altogether  pagan,  Victorinus  was  a 
Christian  only  in  his  head.  In  vain  Simplicianus 
pointed  out  to  him  how  illogical  his  conduct  was. 
But  suddenly  and  unexpectedly  he  decided.  The 
day  of  the  baptism  of  the  catechumens,  this  cele- 
brated man  mounted  the  platform  set  up  in  the 
basilica  for  the  profession  of  faith  of  the  newly 
converted,  and  there,  like  the  meanest  of  the  faith- 
ful, he  delivered  his  profession  before  all  the  as- 
sembled people.  That  was  a  dramatic  stroke.  The 
crowd,  jubilant  over  this  fine  performance,  cheered 
the  neophyte.  And  on  all  sides  they  shouted  : 
"  Victorinus  !    Victorinus  !  " 

Augustin  listened  to  this  little  story,  whereof  all  the 
details  were  so  happily  chosen  to  act  on  an  imagina- 
tion like  his : — the  statue  in  the  Roman  Forum : 


204  SAINT   AUGUSTIN 

the  platform  from  the  height  of  which  the  orator 
had  spoken  a  language  so  new  and  unexpected  ; 
the  exulting  shouts  of  the  crowd  :  "  Victorinus  ! 
Victorinus  !  "  Already  he  saw  himself  in  the  same 
position.  There  he  was  in  the  basilica,  on  the 
platform,  in  presence  of  Bishop  Ambrose  ;  he  too 
repeated  his  profession  of  faith,  and  the  people  of 
Milan  clapped  their  hands — "  Augustin  !  Augus- 
tin  !  "  But  can  a  humble  and  contrite  heart  thus 
take  pleasure  in  human  adulation  ?  If  Augustin 
did  become  a  convert,  it  would  be  entirely  for  God 
and  before  God.  Very  quickly  he  put  aside  the 
temptation.  .  .  .  Nevertheless,  this  example,  coming 
from  so  exalted  a  man,  made  a  very  deep  and  bene- 
ficial impression.  He  looked  upon  it  as  a  pro- 
vidential sign,  a  lesson  in  courage  which  concerned 
him  personally. 

Some  time  after  that,  he  received  a  visit  from  a 
fellow-countryman,  a  certain  Pontitianus,  who  had  a 
high  position  in  the  Imperial  household.  Augustin 
happened  to  be  alone  in  the  house  with  his  friend 
Alypius.  They  sat  down  to  talk,  and  by  chance  the 
visitor  noticed  the  Epistles  of  St.  Paul  lying  on  a 
table  for  playing  games.  This  started  the  conversa- 
tion. Pontitianus,  who  was  a  Christian,  praised  the 
ascetic  life,  and  especially  the  wonders  of  holiness 
wrought  by  Antony  and  his  companions  in  the 
Egyptian  deserts.  This  subject  was  in  the  air.  In 
Catholic  circles  at  Rome,  they  spoke  of  little  else 
than  these  Egyptian  solitaries,  and  of  the  number, 
growing  larger  and  larger,  of  those  who  stripped 
themselves  of  their  worldly  goods  to  live  in  utter 
renunciation.  What  was  the  good  of  keeping 
these  worldly  goods,  that  the  avarice  of  Govern- 


THE   CHRIST  IN   THE  GARDEN       205 

ment  taxation  confiscated  so  easih^  and  that 
the  Barbarians  watched  covetously  from  afar  !  The 
brutes  who  came  down  from  Germany  would  get 
hold  of  them  sooner  or  later.  And  even  supposing 
one  might  save  them,  retain  an  ever-uncertain  enjoy- 
ment of  them,  was  the  life  of  the  time  really  worth 
the  trouble  of  living  ?  There  was  nothing  more  to 
hope  for  the  Empire,  The  hour  of  the  great  desola- 
tion was  at  hand.  .  .  . 

Pontitianus,  observing  the  effect  of  his  words  on 
his  hearers,  was  led  to  tell  them  a  quite  private  ad- 
venture of  his  own.  He  was  at  Treves,  in  attendance 
on  the  Court.  Well,  one  afternoon  while  the  Em- 
peror was  at  the  circus,  he  and  three  of  his  friends, 
like  himself  attached  to  the  household,  went  for 
a  stroll  beyond  the  city  walls.  Two  of  them  parted 
from  the  others  and  went  off  into  the  country,  and 
there  they  came  upon  a  hut  where  dwelt  certain  her- 
mits. They  went  in,  and  found  a  book — The  Life  of 
St.  Antony.  They  read  in  it ;  and  for  them  that  was 
a  conversion  thunder-striking,  instantaneous.  The 
two  courtiers  resolved  to  join  the  solitaries  there 
and  then,  and  they  never  went  back  to  the  Palace. 
And  they  were  betrothed  !  .  .  . 

The  tone  of  Pontitianus  as  he  recalled  this  con- 
science-drama which  he  had  witnessed,  betrayed 
a  strange  emotion  which  gradually  took  hold  of 
Augustin.  His  guest's  words  resounded  in  him  like 
the  blows  of  a  clapper  in  a  bell.  He  saw  himself  in 
the  two  courtiers  of  Treves.  He  too  was  tired  of  the 
world,  he  too  was  betrothed.  Was  he  going  to  do 
as  the  Emperor — remain  in  the  circus  taken  up 
with  idle  pleasures,  while  others  took  the  road  to 
the  sole  happiness  ? 


206  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

^Vhen  Pontitianus  was  gone,  Augustin  was  in  a 
desperate  state.  The  repentant  soul  of  the  two 
courtiers  had  passed  into  his.  His  will  uprose 
in  grievous  conflict  and  tortured  itself.  He  seized 
Alypius  roughly  by  the  arm  and  cried  out  to  him 
in  extraordinary  excitement  : 

"  What  are  we  about  ?  Yes,  I  say,  what  are 
we  about  ?  Did  you  not  hear  ?  Simple  men  arise 
and  take  Heaven  by  violence,  and  we  with  all  our 
heartless  learning — look  how  we  are  wallowing  in 
flesh  and  blood  !  " 

Alypius  stared  at  him,  stupefied.  "  The  truth 
is,"  adds  Augustin,  "  that  I  scarcely  knew  what  I 
said.  My  face,  my  eyes,  my  colour,  and  the  change 
in  my  voice  expressed  my  meaning  much  better 
than  my  words."  If  he  guessed  from  this  upheaval 
of  his  whole  frame  how  close  at  hand  was  the 
heavenly  visitation,  all  he  felt  at  the  moment  was 
a  great  need  to  weep,  and  he  wanted  solitude  to 
weep  freely.  He  went  down  into  the  garden. 
Alypius,  feeling  uneasy,  followed  at  a  distance, 
and  in  silence  sat  down  beside  him  on  the  bench 
where  he  had  paused.  Augustin  did  not  even  notice 
that  his  friend  was  there.  His  agony  of  spirit 
began  again.  All  his  faults,  all  his  old  stains  came 
once  more  to  his  mind,  and  he  grew  furious  against 
his  cowardly  feebleness  as  he  felt  how  much  he  still 
clung  to  them.  Oh,  to  tear  himself  free  from  all 
these  miseries — to  finish  with  them  once  for  all ! 
.  .  .  Suddenly  he  sprang  up.  It  was  as  if  a  gust 
of  the  tempest  had  struck  him.  He  rushed  to  the 
end  of  the  garden,  flung  himself  on  his  knees  under  a 
fig-tree,  and  with  his  forehead  pressed  against  the 
earth  he  burst  into  tears.     Even  as  the  olive-tree 


THE  CHRIST   IN   THE   GARDEN       207 

at  Jerusalem  which  sheltered  the  last  watch  of  the 
Divine  Master,  the  fig-tree  of  Milan  saw  fall  upon 
its  roots  a  sweat  of  blood.  Augustin,  breathless 
in  the  victorious  embrace  of  Grace,  panted  :  "  How 
long,  how  long  ?  .  .  .  To-morrow  and  to-morrow  ? 
.  .  .  Why  not  now  ?  Why  not  this  hour  make  an 
end  of  my  vileness  ?  .  .  ." 

Now,  at  this  very  moment  a  child's  voice  from  the 
neighbouring  house  began  repeating  in  a  kind  of 
chant :  "  Take  and  read,  take  and  read."  Augustin 
shuddered.  What  was  this  refrain  ?  Was  it  a 
nursery-rhyme  that  the  little  children  of  the  country- 
side used  to  sing  ?  He  could  not  recollect  it ;  he 
had  never  heard  it  before.  .  .  .  Immediately,  as 
upon  a  divine  command,  he  rose  to  his  feet  and 
ran  back  to  the  place  where  Alypius  was  sitting,  for 
he  had  left  St.  Paul's  Epistles  lying  there.  He 
opened  the  book,  and  the  passage  on  which  his  eyes 
first  fell  was  this  :  Put  ye  on  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ, 
and  make  not  provision  for  the  flesh  to  fulfil  the  lusts 
thereof.  .  .  .  The  flesh  !  .  .  .  The  sacred  text  aimed 
at  him  directly — at  him,  Augustin,  still  so  full  of  lust ! 
This  command  was  the  answer  from  on  high.  .  .  . 

He  put  his  finger  between  the  leaves,  closed  the 
volume.  His  frenzy  had  passed  away.  A  great  peace 
was  shed  upon  him — it  was  all  over.  With  a  calm 
face  he  told  Alypius  what  had  happened,  and  with- 
out lingering  he  went  into  Monnica's  room  to  tell 
her  also.  The  Saint  was  not  surprised.  It  was  long 
now  since  she  had  been  told,  "  Where  I  am,  there 
shalt  thou  be  also."  But  she  gave  way  to  an  out- 
burst of  joy.  Her  mission  was  done.  Now  she 
might  sing  her  canticle  of  thanksgiving  and  enter 
into  God's  peace. 


208  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

Meanwhile,  the  good  Alypius,  always  circumspect 
and  practical,  had  opened  the  book  again  and 
shewn  his  friend  what  followed  the  verse,  for 
Augustin,  in  his  excitement,  had  neglected  to  read 
further.  The  Apostle  said,  "  Him  that  is  weak  in  the 
faith  receive  ye."  This  also  applied  to  Augustin. 
That  was  only  too  certain  :  his  new  faith  was  still 
very  unstead3\  Let  not  presumption  blind  him  ! 
Yes,  no  doubt  with  all  his  soul  he  desired  to  be  a 
Christian.    It  now  remained  for  him  to  become  one. 


THE    FOURTH    PART 
THE    HIDDEN    LIFE 


Fac  me,  Pater,  quaerere  te. 
"  Cause  me  to  seek  Thee,  O  my  Father." 

Soliloquies^  I,  i. 


THE    LAST   SMILE    OF   THE    MUSE 

NOW  that  Augustin  had  been  at  last  touched 
by  grace,  was  he  after  all  going  to  make  a 
sensational  conversion  like  his  professional  brother, 
the  celebrated  Victorinus  ? 

He  knew  well  enough  that  there  is  a  good  ex- 
ample set  by  these  noisy  conversions  which  works 
on  a  vast  number  of  people.  And  however  ''  con- 
trite and  humble  "  his  heart  might  be,  he  was 
quite  aware  that  in  Milan  he  was  an  important 
personage.  What  excitement,  if  he  were  to  resign 
his  professorship  on  the  ground  that  he  wished  to 
spend  the  rest  of  his  life  in  the  ascetic  way  of  the 
Christians  !  .  .  .  But  he  preferred  to  avoid  the 
scandal  on  one  side,  and  the  loud  praise  on  the 
other.  God  alone  and  some  very  dear  friends 
should  witness  his  repentance. 

There  were  now  hardly  twenty  days  before  the 
vacation.  He  would  be  patient  till  then.  Thus, 
the  parents  of  his  pupils  would  not  have  any  ground 
to  reproach  him  for  leaving  them  before  the  end 
of  term,  and  as  his  health  was  getting  worse,  he 
would  have  a  good  excuse  to  give  up  his  post.  The 
dampness  of  the  climate  had  given  him  a  sort  of 
chronic  bronchitis  which  the  summer  had  not 
cured.  He  had  difficulty  in  breathing  ;  his  voice 
was  muffled  and  thin — so  much  so,  that  he  began 


212  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

to  think  his  lungs  were  attacked.  Augustin's 
health  really  needed  care.  This  was  a  quite  good 
enough  reason  to  interrupt  his  lectures.  Having  ful- 
filled his  professional  duties  to  the  very  end — and 
he  assures  us  that  it  took  some  courage — he  left  the 
professorial  chair  with  the  declared  intention  of 
never  occupying  it  again. 

Here,  then,  he  is  free  from  all  worldly  ties.  From 
now  on  he  can  prepare  himself  for  baptism  in 
silence  and  retreat.  But  still  he  must  live  somehow  ! 
Augustin  had  more  souls  depending  on  him  than 
ever  :  his  son,  his  mother,  his  brother,  his  cousins — 
a  heavy  burthen  which  he  had  been  struggling  under 
for  a  long  time.  It  is  probable  that  once  more 
Romanianus,  who  was  still  in  Milan,  came  to  his 
assistance.  It  will  be  remembered  that  the  Maecenas 
of  Thagaste  had  taken  up  warmly  the  plan  of  a  lay 
monastery  which  Augustin  and  his  friends  had  lost 
their  heads  over,  and  he  had  promised  to  subscribe 
a  large  sum.  Augustin's  retreat  was  a  first  step 
towards  realizing  this  plan  in  a  new  shape.  Romani- 
anus, no  doubt,  approved  of  it.  In  any  case,  he 
asked  Augustin  to  keep  on  giving  lessons  to  his 
son  Licentius.  Another  young  man,  Trygetius, 
begged  for  the  same  favour.  Augustin  therefore  did 
not  intend  to  give  up  his  employment  altogether. 
He  had  changed,  for  the  present  at  least,  from  a 
Government  professor  into  a  private  one. 

This  meant  that  he  had  a  certain  living.  All 
he  wanted  now  was  a  shelter.  A  friend,  a  colleague, 
the  grammarian  Verecundus,  graciously  offered  him 
this.  Verecundus  thus  repaid  a  favour  which  Augus- 
tin had  quite  recently  done  him.  It  was  at  Augus- 
tin's request  that  Nebridius,  who  was  a  friend  of 


THE  LAST  SMILE   OF  THE   MUSE    213 

both,  agreed  to  take  over  the  classes  of  the  gram- 
marian, who  was  obUged  to  go  away.  Although 
rich,  full  of  talent,  and  very  eager  for  peace  and 
solitude,  Nebridius,  simply  out  of  good-nature,  was 
willing  to  take  the  place  of  Verecundus  in  his  very 
modest  employment.  One  cannot  too  much  admire 
the  generosity  and  kindliness  of  these  ancient  and 
Christian  manners.  In  those  days,  friendship  knew 
nothing  of  our  narrow  and  shabby  egoisms. 

Now  Verecundus  owned  a  country  house  just 
outside  Milan,  at  Cassicium.  He  suggested  to 
Augustin  to  spend  the  vacation  there,  and  even  to 
live  there  permanently  with  all  his  people,  on  con- 
dition of  looking  after  the  property  and  keeping 
it  up. 

Attempts  have  been  made  to  find  traces  of  this 
hospitable  dwelling  where  the  future  monk  of 
Thagaste  and  Hippo  bade  farewell  to  the  world. 
Cassicium  has  disappeared.  The  imagination  is 
free  to  rebuild  it  fancifully  in  any  part  of  the  rich 
country  which  lies  about  Milan.  Still,  if  the  youth- 
ful Licentius  has  not  yielded  too  much  to  metaphor 
in  the  verses  wherein  he  recalls  to  Augustin  "  De- 
parted suns  among  Italian  mountain-heights,"  it  is 
likely  that  the  estate  of  Verecundus  lay  upon  those 
first  mountain-slopes  which  roll  into  the  Brianza 
range.  Even  to-day,  the  rich  Milanese  have  their 
country  houses  among  those  hills. 

To  Augustin  and  his  companions  this  flourishing 
Lombardy  must  have  seemed  another  promised 
land.  The  country,  wonderfully  fertile  and  culti- 
vated, is  one  orchard,  where  fruit  trees  cluster,  and,  in 
all  ways,  deep  streams  wind,  slow-flowing  and  stocked 
with  fish.     Everywhere  is   the  tremor   of  running 


214  SAINT   AUGUSTIN 

water — inconceivably  fresh  music  for  African  ears. 
A  scent  of  mint  and  aniseed  ;  fields  with  grass 
growing  high  and  straight  in  which  you  plunge  up 
to  the  knees.  Here  and  there,  deeply  engulfed  little 
valleys  with  their  bunches  of  green  covert,  slashed 
with  the  rose  plumes  of  the  lime  trees  and  the 
burnished  leaves  of  the  hazels,"  and  where  already 
the  northern  firs  lift  their  black  needles.  Far  off, 
blended  in  one  violet  mass,  the  Alps,  peak  upon  peak, 
covered  with  snow  ;  and  nearer  in  view,  sheer 
cliffs,  jutting  fastnesses,  ploughed  through  with  black 
gorges  which  make  flare  out  plainer  the  bronze-gold 
of  their  slopes.  Not  far  off,  the  enchanted  lakes 
slumber.  It  seems  that  an  emblazonment  fluctuates 
from  their  waters,  and  writhing  above  the  crags 
which  imprison  them  drifts  athwart  a  sky  some- 
times a  little  chill — Leonardo's  pensive  sky  of 
shadowed  amethyst — again  of  a  flushed  blue,  where- 
upon float  great  clouds,  silken  and  ruddy,  as  in  the 
backgrounds  of  Veronese's  pictures.  The  beauty  of 
the  light  lightens  and  beautifies  the  over-heavy 
opulence  of  the  land. 

And  wherever  the  country  house  of  Verecundus 
may  be  placed,  some  bit  of  this  triumphal  land- 
scape will  be  found.  As  for  the  house  itself,  Augus- 
tin  has  said  enough  about  it  for  us  to  see  it  fairly 
well.  It  was  no  doubt  one  of  those  old  rustic  build- 
ings, inhabited  only  some  few  months  of  the  year, 
in  the  warmest  season,  and  for  the  rest  of  the  time 
given  over  to  the  frolics  of  mice  and  rats.  Without 
any  pretence  to  architectural  form,  it  had  been  en- 
larged and  renovated  simply  for  the  greater  con- 
venience of  those  who  lived  there.  There  was  no 
attempt  at  symmetry  ;    the  main  door  was  not  in 


THE   LAST   SMILE   OF   THE   MUSE     215 

the  middle  of  the  building,  and  there  was  another 
door  on  one  of  the  sides.  The  sole  luxury  of  this 
country  house  was  perhaps  the  bath-houses.  These 
baths,  however  simple  they  might  be,  nevertheless 
reminded  Augustin  of  the  decoration  of  gymnasiums. 
Does  this  mean  that  he  found  there  rich  pavements, 
mosaics,  and  statues  ?  These  were  quite  usual 
things  in  Roman  villas.  The  Italians  have  always 
had,  at  all  periods,  a  great  fondness  for  statues  and 
mosaics.  Not  very  particular  about  the  quality, 
they  made  up  for  it  by  the  quantity.  And  when  they 
could  not  treat  themselves  to  the  real  thing,  it  was 
good  enough  to  give  themselves  the  make-believe 
in  painting.  I  can  imagine  easily  enough  Verecundus' 
house,  painted  in  fresco  from  top  to  bottom,  inside 
and  out,  like  those  houses  at  Pompeii,  or  the  modern 
Milanese  villas. 

There  was  no  attempt  at  ornamental  gardens  at 
Cassicium.  The  surroundings  must  have  been 
kitchen-garden,  grazing-land,  or  ploughed  fields,  as 
in  a  farm.  A  meadow — not  in  the  least  the  lawns 
found  in  front  of  a  large  country  house — lay  before 
the  dwelling,  which  was  protected  from  sun  and 
wind  by  clumps  of  chestnut  trees.  There,  stretched 
on  the  grass  under  the  shade  of  one  of  these  spread- 
ing trees,  they  chatted  gaily  while  listening  to  the 
broken  song  of  the  brook,  as  it  flowed  under  the 
windows  of  the  baths.  They  lived  very  close  to 
nature,  almost  the  life  of  field-tillers.  The  whole 
charm  of  Cassicium  consisted  in  its  silence,  its  peace, 
and,  above  all,  its  fresh  air.  Augustin's  tired  lungs 
breathed  there  a  purer  air  than  in  Milan,  where  the 
humid  summer  heat  is  crushing.  His  soul,  yearning 
for  retirement,  discovered  a  retreat  here  in  harmony 


2i6  SAINT   AUGUSTIN 

with  his  new  desires,  a  country  soHtude  of  which 
the  Virgihan  grace  still  appealed  to  his  literary 
imagination.  The  days  he  passed  there  were  days 
of  blessedness  for  him.  Long  afterwards  he  was 
deeply  moved  when  he  recalled  them,  and  in  an 
/  outburst  of  gratitude  towards  his  host,  he  prayed 
God  to  pay  him  his  debt.  "  Thou  wilt  recompense 
him,  O  Lord,  on  the  day  of  the  resurrection  of  the 
just.  .  .  .  For  that  country  house  at  Cassicium 
where  we  found  shelter  in  Thee  from  the  burning 
summer  of  our  time,  Thou  wilt  repay  to  Verecundus 
the  coolness  and  evergreen  shade  of  Thy  paradise.  ..." 
That  was  an  unequalled  moment  in  Augustin's 
life.  Following  immediately  upon  the  mental  crisis 
which  had  even  worn  out  his  bod}^,  he  seems  to  be 
experiencing  the  pleasure  of  convalescence.  He 
slackens,  and,  as  he  says  himself,  he  rests.  His 
excitement  is  quenched,  but  his  faith  remains  as 
firm  as  ever.  With  a  calm  and  supremely  lucid 
mind  he  judges  his  condition  ;  he  sees  clearly  all 
that  he  has  still  to  do  ere  he  becomes  a  thorough 
Christian.  First,  he  must  grow  familiar  with  the 
Scripture,  solve  certain  urgent  questions — that  of 
the  soul,  for  example,  its  nature  and  origin — which 
possessed  him  just  then.  Then  he  must  change  his 
conduct,  alter  his  ways  of  thought,  and,  if  one  may 
so  speak,  disinfect  his  mind  still  all  saturated  with 
pagan  influences :  a  delicate  work — yes,  and  an 
uneasy,  at  times  even  painful,  which  would  take 
more  than  one  day. 

After  twenty  centuries  of  Christianity,  and  in 
spite  of  our  claim  to  understand  all  things,  we  do 
not  yet  realize  very  well  what  an  abyss  lies  between 
us  and  paganism.     When  by  chance  we  come  upon 


THE  LAST  SMILE   OF  THE   MUSE    217 

pagan  traces  in  certain  primitive  regions  of  the 
South  of  Europe,  we  get  muddled,  and  attribute  to 
CathoHcism  what  is  but  a  survival  of  old  abolished 
customs,  so  far  from  us  that  we  cannot  recognize 
them  any  more.  Augustin,  on  the  contrary,  was 
right  next  to  them.  When  he  strolled  over  the 
fields  and  through  the  woods  around  Cassicium,  the 
Fauns  and  woodland  Nymphs  of  the  old  mythology 
haunted  his  memory,  and  all  but  stood  before  his 
eyes.  He  could  not  take  a  walk  without  coming 
upon  one  of  their  chapels,  or  striking  against  a 
boundary-mark  still  all  greasy  from  the  oil  with 
which  the  superstitious  peasants  had  drenched  it. 
Like  himself,  the  old  pagan  land  had  not  yet  quite 
put  on  the  Christ  of  the  new  era.  He  was  like  that 
Hermes  Criophorus,  who  awkwardly  symbolized 
the  Saviour  on  the  walls  of  the  Catacombs.  Even 
as  the  Bearer  of  Rams  changed  little  by  little  into 
the  Good  Shepherd,  the  Bishop  of  Hippo  emerged 
slowly  from  the  rhetorician  Augustin. 

He  became  aware  of  it  during  that  languid 
autumn  at  Cassicium — that  autumn  heavy  with  all 
the  rotting  of  summer,  but  which  already  promised 
the  great  winter  peace.  The  yellow  leaves  of  the 
chestnuts  were  heaped  by  the  roadside.  They  fell 
in  the  brook  which  flowed  near  the  baths,  and  the 
slowed  water  ceased  to  sing.  Augustin  strained  his 
ears  for  it.  His  soul  also  was  blocked,  choked  up 
by  all  the  deposit  of  his  passions.  But  he  knew  that 
soon  the  chant  of  his  new  life  would  begin  in  trium- 
phal fashion,  and  he  said  over  to  himself  the  words 
of  the  psalm  :  Cantata  mihi  canticum  novum — 
*'  Sing  unto  me  a  new  song." 

Unfortunately    for    Augustin,    his    soul    and   its 


2i8  SAINT   AUGUSTIN 

salvation  was  not  his  only  care  at  Cassicium  :    he 
had  a  thousand  others.     So  it  shall  be  with  him 
throughout  his  life.     Till  the  very  end  he  will  long 
for  solitude,  for  the  life  in  God,  and  till  the  end  God 
will  charge  him  with  the  care  of  his  brethren.    This 
great  spirit  shall  live  above  all  by  charity, 
f     At  the  house  of  Verecundus  he  was  not  only  the 
head,   but   he   had   a   complete   country  estate   to 
direct  and  supervise.    Probably  all  the  gaests  in  the 
house  helped  him.     They  divided  the  duties.     The 
good  Alypius,  who  was  used  to  business  and  versed 
in  the  twisted  ways  of  the  law,  took  over  the  foreign 
affairs — the  buying  and  selling,   probably  the   ac- 
counts also.     He  was  continually  on  the  road  to 
Milan.     Augustin  attended  to  the  correspondence, 
and  every   morning  appointed  their  work  to  the 
farm-labourers.     Monnica  looked  after  the  house- 
hold, no  easy  work  in  a  house  where  nine  sat  down 
to   table   every   day.      But   the   Saint   fulfilled  her 
I    humble  duties  with  touching  kindness  and  forget- 
'    fulness   of    self  :     "  She    took    care    of    us,"    says 
j     Augustin,   "as   if   we  had  all   been    her    children, 
'     and  she  served  us  as  if  each  of  us  had  been  her 
,     father." 

Let  us  look  a  little  at  these  "  children  "  of  Mon- 
nica. Besides  Alypius,  whom  we  know  already, 
there  was  the  young  Adeodatus,  the  child  of  sin — 
"  my  son  Adeodatus,  whose  gifts  gave  promise  of 
great  things,  unless  my  love  for  him  betrays  me." 
Thus  speaks  his  father.  This  little  boy  was,  it  seems, 
/  a  prodigy,  as  shall  be  the  little  Blaise  Pascal  later  : 
"  His  intelligence  filled  me  with  awe  " — horrori 
1  )  mihi  erat  illud  ingenium — says  the  father  again. 
What  is  certain  is  that  he  had  a  soul  like  an  angel. 


THE   LAST   SMILE   OF   THE   MUSE     219 

Some  sayings  of  his  have  been  preserved  by  Augus- 
tin.    They  are  fragrant  as  a  bunch  of  hUes. 

The  other  members  of  the  family  are  nearer  the 
earth.  Navigius,  Augustin's  brother,  an  excellent  /  . 
man  of  whom  we  know  nothing  save  that  he  had  /  1  f 
a  bad  liver — the  icterus  of  the  African  colonist — 
and  that  on  this  account  he  abstained  from  sweet- 
meats. Rusticus  and  Lastidianus,  the  two  cousins, 
persons  as  shadow}^  as  the  "  supers  "  in  a  tragedy. 
Finally,  Augustin's  pupils,  Trygetius  and  Licentius. 
The  first,  who  had  lately  served  some  time  in  the 
army,  was  passionately  fond  of  history,  "  like  a 
veteran."  Although  his  master  in  some  of  his 
Dialogues  has  made  him  his  interlocutor,  his  char- 
acter remains  for  us  undeveloped.  With  Licentius 
it  is  different.  This  son  of  Romanianus,  the  Mae- 
cenas of  Thagaste,  was  Augustin's  beloved  pupil. 
It  is  easy  to  make  that  out.  All  the  phrases  he 
devotes  to  Licentius  have  a  warmth  of  tone,  a  colour 
and  relief  which  thrill. 

This  Licentius  comes  before  us  as  the  type  of  the 
spoiled  child,  the  son  of  a  wealthy  family,  capricious, 
vain,  presuming,  unabashed,  never  hesitating  if  he 
sees  a  chance  to  have  a  joke  with  his  master.  For- 
getful, besides,  prone  to  sudden  fancies,  superficial, 
and  rather  blundering.  With  all  that,  the  best  boy 
in  the  world — a  bad  head,  but  a  good  heart.  He 
was  a  frank  pagan,  and  I  believe  remained  a  pagan 
all  his  life,  in  spite  of  the  remonstrances  of  Augustin 
and  those  of  the  gentle  Paulinus  of  Nola,  who 
lectured  him  in  prose  and  verse.  A  great  eater  and  a 
fine  drinker,  he  found  himself  obliged  to  do  penance 
at  St.  Monnica's  rather  frugal  table.  But  when  the 
fever  of   inspiration   took   hold  of  him,  he  forgot 


220  SAINT   AUGUSTIN 

eating  and  drinking,  and  in  his  poetical  thirst  he  would 
would  have  drained — so  his  master  says — all  the 
fountains  of  Helicon.  Licentius  had  a  passion  for 
versifying  :  "  He  is  an  almost  perfect  poet,"  wrote 
Augustin  to  Romanianus,  The  former  rhetorician 
knew  the  world,  and  the  way  to  talk  to  the  father  of 
a  wealthy  pupil,  especially  if  he  is  your  benefactor. 
At  Cassicium,  under  Augustin's  indulgent  eyes,  the 
pupil  turned  into  verse  the  romantic  adventure  of 
P\Tamus  and  Thisbe.  He  declaimed  bits  of  it  to  the 
guests  in  the  house,  for  he  had  a  fine  loud  voice. 
Then  he  flung  aside  the  unfinished  poem  and  sud- 
denly fell  in  love  with  Greek  tragedies  of  which,  as 
it  happened,  he  understood  nothing  at  all,  though 
this  did  not  prevent  him  from  boring  everybody  he 
met  with  them.  Another  day  it  was  the  Church 
music,  then  quite  new,  which  flung  him  into  enthu- 
siasm. That  day  they  heard  Licentius  singing  can- 
ticles from  morning  till  night. 

In  connection  with  this,  Augustin  relates  with 
candid  freedom  an  anecdote  which  to-day  needs 
the  indulgence  of  the  reader  to  make  it  acceptable. 
As  it  gives  light  upon  that  half-pagan,  half-Chris- 
tian way  of  life  which  was  still  Augustin's,  I  will 
repeat  it  in  all  its  plainness. 

It  happened,  then,  one  evening  after  dinner,  that 
Licentius  went  out  and  took  his  way  to  a  certain 
mysterious  retreat,  and  there  he  suddenly  began 
singing  this  verse  of  the  Psalm  :  "  Turn  us  again, 
O  Lord  God  of  hosts,  cause  Thy  face  to  shine  ;  and 
we  shall  be  saved."  As  a  matter  of  fact,  he  had 
hardly  sung  anything  else  for  a  long  time.  He  kept 
on  repeating  this  verse  over  and  over  again,  as 
people  do  with  a  tune  they  have  just  picked  up. 


THE   LAST  SMILE  OF  THE   MUSE     221 

But  the  pious  Monnica,  who  heard  him,  could  not 
tolerate  the  singing  of  such  holy  words  in  such  a 
place.  She  spoke  sharply  to  the  offender.  Upon 
this  the  young  scatter-brains  answered  rather  flip- 
pantly : 

"  Supposing,  good  mother,  that  an  enemy  had 
shut  me  up  in  that  place — do  you  mean  to  say  that 
God  wouldn't  have  heard  me  just  the  same  ?  " 

The  next  day  he  thought  no  more  about  it,  and 
when  Augustin  reminded  him,  he  declared  that  he 
felt  no  remorse. 

"  As  far  as  I  am  concerned,"  replied  the  excellent 
master,  "  I  am  not  in  the  least  shocked  by  it.  .  .  . 
The  truth  is,  that  neither  that  place,  which  has  so 
much  scandalized  my  mother,  nor  the  darkness  of 
night,  is  altogether  inappropriate  to  this  canticle. 
For  whence,  think  you,  do  we  implore  God  to  drag 
us,  so  that  we  may  be  converted  and  gaze  upon  His 
face  ?  Is  it  not  from  that  jakes  of  the  senses  wherein 
our  souls  are  plunged,  and  from  that  darkness  of 
which  the  error  is  around  us  ?   .  .  ." 

And  as  they  were  discussing  that  day  the  order 
established  by  Providence,  Augustin  made  it  a 
pretext  to  give  a  little  edifying  lecture  to  his  pupil. 
Having  heard  the  sermon  to  the  end,  the  sharp 
Licentius  put  in  with  sly  maliciousness  : 

"  I  say,  what  a  splendid  arrangement  of  events 
to  shew  me  that  nothing  happens  except  in  the  best 
way,  and  for  our  great  good  !  " 

This  reply  gives  us  the  tone  of  the  conversation 
between  Augustin  and  his  pupils.  Nevertheless, 
however  free  and  merry  the  talks  might  be,  the 
purpose  was  always  instructive,  and  it  was  always 
substantial.     Let  us  not  forget  that  the  Milanese 


222  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

rhetorician  is  still  a  professor.  The  best  part  of 
his  days  was  devoted  to  these  two  youths  who  had 
been  put  under  his  charge.  As  soon  as  he  had  settled 
the  business  of  the  farm,  talked  to  the  peasants,  and 
given  his  orders  to  the  workmen,  he  fell  back  upon 
his  business  of  rhetorician.  In  the  morning  they 
went  over  Virgil's  Eclogues  together.  At  night  they 
discussed  philosophy.  When  the  weather  was  fine 
they  walked  in  the  fields,  and  the  discussion  con- 
tinued under  the  shade  of  the  chestnut  trees.  If  it 
rained,  they  took  refuge  in  the  withdrawing-room 
adjoining  the  baths.  Beds  were  there,  cushions, 
soft  chairs  convenient  for  talking,  and  the  equal 
temperature  from  the  vapour-baths  close  at  hand 
was  good  for  Augustin's  bronchial  tubes. 

There  is  no  stiffness  in  these  dialogues,  nothing 
which  smacks  of  the  school.  The  discussion  starts 
from  things  which  they  had  under  the  eyes,  often 
from  some  slight  accidental  happening.  One  night 
when  Augustin  could  not  sleep — he  often  suffered  from 
insomnia — the  dispute  began  in  bed,  for  the  master 
and  his  pupils  slept  in  the  same  room.  Lying  there 
in  the  dark,  he  listened  to  the  broken  murmur  of 
the  stream.  He  was  trying  to  think  out  an  expla- 
i  nation  of  the  pauses  in  the  sound,  when  Licentius 
1  shifted  under  the  bedclothes,  and  reaching  out  for  a 
I  piece  of  stick  lying  on  the  floor,  he  rapped  with  it 
on  the  foot  of  the  bed  to  frighten  the  mice.  So  he 
was  not  asleep  either,  nor  Trygetius,  who  was 
stirring  about  in  his  bed.  Augustin  was  delighted  : 
he  had  two  listeners.  Immediately  he  put  this 
question  :  "  Why  do  those  pauses  come  in  the 
flow  of  the  stream  ?  Do  they  not  follow  some 
secret  law  ?  .  .  ."     They  had  hit  upon  a  subject 


THE   LAST   SMILE   OF  THE   MUSE     223 

for  debate.  During  many  days  they  discussed  the 
order  of  the  world. 

Another  time,  as  they  were  going  into  the  baths, 
they  stopped  to  look  at  two  cocks  fighting.  Augus- 
tin  called  the  attention  of  the  youths  "  to  a  certain 
order  full  of  propriety  in  all  the  movements  of  these 
fowls  deprived  of  reason." 

"  Look  at  the  conqueror,"  said  he.  "  He  crows 
triumphantly.  He  struts  and  plumes  himself  as  a 
proud  sign  of  victory.  And  now  look  at  the  beaten 
one,  without  voice,  his  neck  unfeathered,  a  look 
of  shame.  All  that  has  I  know  not  what  beauty,  in 
harmony  with  the  laws  of  nature.  ..." 

New  argument  in  favour  of  order  :  the  debate 
of  the  night  before  is  started  rolling  again. 

For  us,  too,  it  is  well  worth  while  to  pause  on  this 
little  homely  scene.  It  reveals  to  us  an  Augustin 
not  only  very  sensitive  to  beauty,  but  very  attentive 
to  the  sights  of  the  world  surrounding  him.  Cock- 
fights were  still  very  popular  in  this  Roman  society 
at  the  ending  of  the  Empire.  For  a  long  time  sculp- 
tors had  found  many  gracious  subjects  in  the  sport. 
Reading  this  passage  of  Augustin's,  one  recalls, 
among  other  similar  designs,  that  funeral  urn  at  the 
Lateran  upon  which  are  represented  two  little  boys, 
one  crying  over  his  beaten  cock,  while  the  other 
holds  his  tenderly  in  his  arms  and  kisses  it — the  cock 
that  won,  identified  by  the  crown  held  in  its  spurs. 

Augustin  is  always  very  close  to  these  humble 
realities.  Every  moment  outside  things  start  up  in 
the  dialogues  between  the  master  and  his  pupils.  .  .  . 
They  are  in  bed  on  a  rainy  night  in  November. 
Gradually,  a  vague  gleam  rests  on  the  windows. 
They  ask  each  other  if  that  can  be  the  moon,  or  the 


J 


224  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

break  of  day.  .  .  .  Another  time,  the  sun  rises  in 
all  its  splendour,  and  they  decide  to  go  into  the 
meadow  and  sit  on  the  grass.  Or  else,  the  sky 
darkens  and  lights  are  brought  in.  Or  again,  it  is 
the  appearance  of  diligent  Alypius,  just  come  back 
from  Milan.  .  .  . 

In  the  same  way  as  he  notes  these  light  details 

rin  passing,  Augustin  welcomes  all  his  guests  into 

!  his  dialogues  and  admits  them  to  the  debate  :    his 

I  mother,  his  brother,  the  cousins,  Alj^ius  between 

his  business  journeys,  down  to  the  child  Adeodatus. 

He   knew  the   value   of  ordinary  good  sense,   the 

second-sight  of  a  pure  heart,   or  of  a  pious  soul 

strengthened  by  prayer.      Monnica  used   often   to 

come  into  the  room  when  they  were  arguing,  to  let 

them  know  that  dinner  was  ready,  or  for  something 

of  the  kind.    Her  son  asked  her  to  remain.    Modestly 

she  shewed  her  astonishment  at  such  an  honour. 

"  Mother,"  said  Augustin,  "  do  you  not  love 
truth  ?  Then  why  should  I  blush  to  give  you  a  place 
among  us  ?  Even  if  your  love  for  truth  were  only 
half-hearted,  I  ought  still  to  receive  you  and  listen 
to  you.  How  much  more  then,  since  you  love  it 
more  than  you  love  me,  a7td  I  know  how  much  you 
love  me.  .  .  .  Nothing  can  separate  you  from  truth, 
neither  fear,  nor  pain  of  whatever  kind  it  be — no, 
nor  death  itself.  Do  not  all  agree  that  this  is  the 
highest  stage  of  philosophy  ?  How  can  I  hesitate 
after  that  to  call  myself  your  disciple  ?  " 

And  Monnica,  utterly  confused  by  such  praise, 
answered  with  affectionate  gruffness  : 

"  Stop  talking  !  You  have  never  told  bigger 
lies." 

Most  of  the  time  these  conversations  were  simply 


THE  LAST  SMILE   OF  THE   MUSE    225 

dialectic  games  in  the  taste  of  the  period,  games  a 
httle  pedantic,  and  fatiguing  from  subtilty.  The 
boisterous  Licentius  did  not  always  enjoy  himself. 
He  was  often  inattentive,  and  his  master  scolded 
him.  But  all  the  same,  the  master  understood  how 
to  amuse  his  two  foster-children  while  he  exercised 
their  intelligence.  At  the  end  of  one  discussion  he 
said  to  them  laughing  : 

"  Just  at  this  hour,  the  sun  warns  me  to  put  the 
playthings  I  had  brought  for  the  children  back  in 
the  basket.  ..." 

Let  us  remark  in  passing  that  this  is  the  last  time, 
before  those  centuries  which  are  coming  of  uni- 
versal intellectual  silence  or  arid  scholasticism — the 
last  time  that  high  questions  will  be  discussed  in 
this  graceful  light  way,  and  with  the  same  freedom 
of  mind.  The  tradition  begun  by  Socrates  under  the 
plane-trees  on  the  banks  of  the  Ilissus,  is  ending 
with  Augustin  under  the  chestnuts  of  Cassicium. 

And  yet,  however  gay  and  capricious  the 
form,  the  substance  of  these  dialogues,  "  On  the 
Academics,"  "  On  Order,"  and  "  On  the  Happy 
Life,"  is  serious,  and  even  very  serious.  The 
best  proof  of  their  importance  in  Augustin's  eyes 
is,  that  after  taking  care  to  have  them  reported  in 
shorthand,  he  eventually  published  them.  The 
notarii  attended  these  discussions  and  let  nothing  be 
lost.  The  rise  of  the  scrivener,  of  the  notary,  dates 
from  this  period.  The  administration  of  the  Lower- 
Empire  was  frightfully  given  to  scribbling.  By  con- 
tact with  it,  the  Church  became  so  too.  Let  us  not 
press  our  complaints  about  it,  since  this  craze  for 
writing  has  procured  for  us,  with  a  good  deal  of  shot- 
rubbish,   some  precious  historical  documents.     In 

Q 


226  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

Augustin's  case,  these  reports  of  his  lectures  at 
Cassicium  have  at  least  the  value  of  shewing  us 
the  state  of  soul  of  the  future  Bishop  of  Hippo  at 
a  decisive  moment  of  his  life. 

For  these  Dialogues,  although  they  look  like 
school  exercises,  reveal  the  intimate  thoughts  of 
Augustin  on  the  morrow  of  his  conversion.  While 
he  seems  to  be  refuting  the  Academics,  he  is  fighting 
the  errors  from  which  he,  personally,  had  suffered 
so  long.  He  clarified  his  new  ideal.  No  ;  the  search 
for  truth,  without  hope  of  ever  reaching  it,  cannot 
give  happiness.  And  genuine  happiness  is  only  in 
God.  And  if  a  rhythm  is  to  be  found  in  things,  then 
it  is  necessary  to  make  the  soul  rhythmic  also  and 
so  enable  it  to  contemplate  God.  It  is  necessary 
to  still  within  it  the  noise  of  the  passions.  Hence, 
the  need  of  inward  reformation,  and,  at  a  final 
analysis,  of  asceticism. 

But  Augustin  knew  full  well  that  these  truths 
must  be  adapted  to  the  weakness  of  the  two  lads 
he  was  teaching,  and  also  to  the  common  run  of 
mankind.  He  has  not  yet  in  these  years  the  un- 
compromising attitude  which  ere  long  will  give 
him  a  sterner  virtue — an  attitude,  however,  un- 
ceasingly tempered  by  his  charity  and  b}^  the  per- 
sistent recollections  of  his  reading.  It  was  now 
that  he  shaped  the  rule  of  conduct  in  worldly 
morals  and  education  which  the  Christian  ex- 
perience of  the  future  will  adopt  :  "If  you  have 
always  order  in  your  hearts,"  he  said  to  his  pupils, 
"  you  must  return  to  your  verses.  For  a  knowledge 
of  liberal  sciences,  but  a  controlled  and  exact  know- 
ledge, forms  men  who  will  love  the  truth.  .  .  .  But 
there  are  other  men,  or,  to  put  it  better,  other  souls, 


THE   LAST   SMILE   OF  THE   MUSE     227 

who,  although  held  in  the  body,  are  sought  for  the 
eternal  marriage  by  the  best  and  fairest  of  spouses. 
For  these  souls  it  is  not  enough  to  live  ;  they  wish 
to  live  happy.  .  .  .  But  as  for  you,  go,  mean- 
while, and  find  your  Muses  !  " 

"  Go  and  find  your  Muses  !  "  What  a  fine  say- 
ing !  How  human  and  how  wise  !  Here  is  clearly 
indicated  the  double  ideal  of  those  who  continue 
to  live  in  the  world  according  to  the  Christian  law 
of  restraint  and  moderation,  and  of  those  who 
yearn  to  live  in  God.  With  Augustin  the  choice  is 
made.  He  will  never  more  look  back.  These 
Dialogues  at  Cassicium  are  his  supreme  farewell  to 
the  pagan  Muse. 


II 

THE    ECSTASY   OF   SAINT   MONNICA 

THEY  stayed  through  the  winter  at  Cassicium. 
However  taken  up  he  might  be  by  the  work 
of  the  estate  and  the  care  of  his  pupils,  Augustin 
devoted  himself  chiefly  to  the  great  business  of  his 
salvation. 

The  Soliloquies,  which  he  wrote  then,  render  even 
the  passionate  tone  of  the  meditations  which  he 
perpetually  gave  way  to  during  his  watches  and 
nights  of  insomnia.  He  searched  for  God,  moaning  : 
Fac  me,  Pater,  queer  ere  te — "  Cause  me  to  seek  Thee, 
O  my  Father."  But  still,  he  sought  Him  more  as 
a  philosopher  than  as  a  Christian.  The  old  man 
in  him  was  not  dead.  He  had  not  quite  stripped  off 
the  rhetorician  or  the  intellectual.  The  over-tender 
heart  remained,  which  had  so  much  sacrificed  to 
human  love.  In  those  ardent  dialogues  between 
himself  and  his  reason,  it  is  plain  to  see  that  reason 
is  not  quite  the  mistress.  ''  I  love  only  God  and 
the  soul,"  Augustin  states  with  a  touch  of  presump- 
tion. And  his  reason,  which  knows  him  well, 
answers  :  "  Do  you  not  then  love  your  friends  ?  " — 
"  I  love  the  soul ;  how  therefore  should  I  not  love 
them  ?  "  What  does  this  phrase,  of  such  exquisite 
sensibility,  and  even  already  so  aloof  from  worldly 
thoughts — what  does  it  lack  to  give  forth  a  sound 
entirely  Christian  ?     Just  a  slight  change  of  accent. 

228 


THE   ECSTASY   OF   SAINT   MONNICA    229 

He  himself  began  to  see  that  he  would  do  better 
not  to  philosophize  so  much  and  to  draw  nearer 
the  Scripture,  in  listening  to  the  wisdom  of  that 
with  a  contrite  and  humble  heart.  Upon  the  direc- 
tions of  Ambrose,  whose  advice  he  had  asked  by 
letter,  he  tried  to  read  the  prophet  Isaiah,  because 
Isaiah  is  the  clearest  foreteller  of  the  Redemption. 
He  found  the  book  so  difficult  that  he  lost  heart, 
and  he  put  it  aside  till  later.  Meanwhile,  he  had 
forwarded  his  resignation  as  professor  of  Rhetoric 
to  the  Milan  municipality.  Then,  when  the  time 
was  come,  he  sent  to  Bishop  Ambrose  a  written 
confession  of  his  errors  and  faults,  and  represented 
to  him  his  very  firm  intention  to  be  baptized.  He 
was  quietly  baptized  on  the  twenty-fifth  of  April, 
during  the  Easter  season  of  the  year  387,  together 
with  his  son  Adeodatus,  and  his  friend  Alypius. 
Atypius  had  prepared  most  piously,  disciplining 
himself  with  the  harshest  austerities,  to  the  point 
of  walking  barefoot  on  the  frozen  soil. 

So  now  the  solitaries  of  Cassicium  are  back  in 
Milan.  Augustin's  two  pupils  were  gone.  Trygetius 
doubtless  had  rejoined  the  army.  Licentius  had 
gone  to  live  in  Rome.  But  another  fellow-country- 
man, an  African  from  Thagaste,  Evodius,  formerly 
a  clerk  in  the  Ministry  of  the  Interior,  came  to  join 
the  small  group  of  new  converts.  Evodius,  the 
future  Bishop  of  Uzalis,  in  Africa,  and  baptized 
before  Augustin,  was  a  man  of  scrupulous  piety  and 
unquestioning  faith.  He  talked  of  devout  subjects 
with  his  friend,  who,  just  fresh  from  baptism,  ex- 
perienced all  the  quietude  of  grace.  The^^  spoke  of 
the  community  which  St.  Ambrose  had  either 
founded  or  organized  at  the  gates  of  Milan,  and  in 


\/' 


230  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

comparison  with  a  life  so  austere,  Augustin  per- 
ceived that  the  Ufe  he  had  led  at  Cassicium  was 
still  stained  with  paganism.  He  must  carry  out  his 
conversion  to  the  end  and  live  as  a  hermit  after  the 
manner  of  Antony  and  the  solitaries  of  the  Thebaid. 
Then  it  occurred  to  him  that  he  still  owned  a  little 
propert}^  at  Thagaste — a  house  and  fields.  There 
they  w^ould  settle  and  live  in  self-denial  like  the 
monks.  The  purity  of  the  young  Adeodatus  pre- 
destined him  to  this  ascetic  existence.  As  for 
Monnica,  who  long  since  had  taken  the  widow's 
veil,  she  had  to  make  no  change  in  her  ways  to  lead 
a  saintly  life  in  the  company  of  her  son  and  grandson. 
It  was  agreed  among  them  all  to  go  back  to  Africa, 
and  to  start  as  soon  as  possible. 

Thus,  just  after  his  baptism,  Augustin  shews  but 
one  desire  :  to  bury  himself  in  a  retreat,  to  lead  a 
humble  and  hidden  life,  divided  between  the  study 
of  the  Scripture  and  the  contemplation  of  God. 
Later  on,  his  enemies  were  to  accuse  him  of  having 
become  a  convert  from  ambition,  in  view  of  the 
honours  and  riches  of  the  episcopate.  This  is  sheer 
calumny.  His  conversion  could  not  have  been 
more  sincere,  more  disinterested — nor  more  heroic 
either:  he  was  thirty-three  years  old.  When  we 
think  of  all  he  had  loved  and  all  he  gave  up,  we 
can  only  bow  the  head  and  bend  the  knee  before  the 
lofty  virtue  of  such  an  example. 

In  the  course  of  the  summer  the  caravan  started 
and  crossed  the  Apennines  to  set  sail  at  Ostia.  The 
date  of  this  exodus  has  never  been  made  quite 
clear.  Perhaps  Augustin  and  his  companions  fled 
before  the  hordes  of  the  usurper  Maximus,  who, 
towards  the  end  of  August,  crossed  the  Alps  and 


THE  ECSTASY   OF  SAINT  MONNICA    231 ' 

marched  on  Milan,  while  the  young  Valentinian 
with  all  his  Court  took  refuge  at  Aquileia.  In  any 
case,  it  was  a  trying  journey,  especially  in  the  hot 
weather.  When  Monnica  arrived  she  was  very 
enfeebled.  At  Ostia  they  had  to  wait  till  a  ship  was 
sailing  for  Africa.  Propitious  conditions  did  not 
offer  every  day.  At  this  period,  travellers  were  at  the 
mercy  of  the  sea,  of  the  wind,  and  of  a  thousand  other 
circumstances.  Time  did  not  count  ;  it  was  wasted 
freely.  The  ship  sailed  short  distances  at  a  time, 
skirting  the  coasts,  where  the  length  of  the  staj^  at 
every  point  touched  depended  on  the  master.  On 
board  these  ships — feluccas  hardly  decked  over — if 
the  crossing  was  endless  and  unsafe,  it  was,  above 
all,  most  uncomfortable.  People  were  in  no  hurry 
to  undergo  the  tortures  of  it,  and  spaced  them  out 
as  much  as  possible  by  frequent  stoppages.  On 
account  of  all  these  reasons,  our  Africans  made  a 
rather  long  stay  at  Ostia.  They  lodged,  no  doubt, 
with  Christian  brethren,  hosts  of  Augustin  or  Monnica, 
in  a  tranquil  house  far  out  of  earshot  of  the  cosmo- 
politan crowd  which  overflowed  in  the  hotels  on  the 
quay. 

Ostia,  situated  at  the  mouth  of  the  Tiber,  was 
both  the  port  and  bond-warehouse  of  Rome.  The 
Government  stores-ships  landed  the  African  oil  and 
corn  there.  It  was  a  junction  for  commerce,  the 
point  where  immigrants  from  all  parts  of  the  Mediter- 
ranean disbarked.  To-day  there  is  only  left  a  wretched 
little  village.  But  at  some  distance  from  this 
hamlet,  the  excavations  of  archaeologists  have 
lately  brought  to  light  the  remains  of  a  large  town. 
They  have  discovered  at  the  entrance  a  place  of 
burial  with  arcosol-tombs  ;    and  here  perhaps  the 


.^ 


232  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

body  of  St.  Monnica  was  laid.  In  this  place  of 
graves  they  came  upon  also  a  beautiful  statue  in- 
jured— a  funeral  Genius,  or  a  Victory,  with  large 
folded  wings  like  those  of  the  Christian  angels. 
Further  on,  the  forum  with  its  shops,  the  guard- 
house of  the  night-cohort,  baths,  a  theatre,  many 
large  temples,  arcaded  streets  paved  with  large  flags, 
warehouses  for  merchandise.  There  may  still  be 
seen,  lining  the  walls,  the  holes  in  which  the  ends 
of  the  amphorae  used  to  be  dropped  to  keep  them 
upright.  All  this  wreckage  gives  an  idea  of  a  popu- 
lous centre  where  the  stir  of  traffic  and  shipping  was 
intense. 

And  yet  in  this  noisy  town,  Augustin  and  his 
mother  found  means  to  withdraw  themselves  and 
join  together  in  meditation  and  prayer.  Amid 
this  rather  vulgar  activity,  in  a  noise  of  trade  and 
seafaring,  a  mystic  scene  develops  where  the  puri- 
fied love  of  mother  and  son  gleams  upon  us  as  in 
a  light  of  apotheosis.  They  had  at  Ostia  a  foretaste, 
so  to  speak,  of  the  eternal  union  in  God.  This  was 
in  the  house  where  they  had  come  on  arrival.  They 
talked  softly,  resting  against  a  window  which  looked 
upon  the  garden.  .  .  .  But  the  scene  has  been  made 
popular  by  Ary  Scheffer's  too  well-known  painting. 
You  remember  it :  two  faces,  pale,  bloodless,  stripped 
of  flesh,  in  which  live  only  the  burning  eyes  cast  up- 
ward to  the  sky — a  dense  sky,  baffling,  heavy  with 
all  the  secrets  of  eternity.  No  visible  object,  nothing, 
absolutely  nothing,  distracts  them  from  their  con- 
templation. The  sea  itself,  although  indicated  by 
the  painter,  almost  blends  into  the  blue  line  of  the 
horizon.  Two  souls  and  the  sky — there  you  have 
the  whole  subject. 


THE   ECSTASY   OF   SAINT   MONNICA    233 

It  is  living  poetry  congealed  in  abstract  thought. 
The  attitude  of  the  characters,  majesticalty  seated, 
instead  of  leaning  on  the  window-ledge,  has,  in 
Scheffer's  picture,  I  know  not  what  touch  of  stiffness, 
of  slightly  theatrical.  And  the  general  impression 
is  a  cold  dryness  which  contrasts  with  the  lyric 
warmth  of  the  story  in  the  Confessions. 

For  my  part,  I  always  thought,  perhaps  on  the 
testimony  of  the  picture,  that  the  window  of  the 
house  at  Ostia  opened  above  the  garden  in  view  of  the 
sea.  The  sea,  symbol  of  the  infinite,  ought  to  be  pre- 
sent— so  it  seemed  to  me — at  the  final  conversation 
between  Monnica  and  Augustin.  At  Ostia  itself  I 
was  obliged  to  give  up  this  too  literary  notion ;  the 
sea  is  not  visible  there.  No  doubt  at  that  time 
the  channel  was  not  so  silted  up  as  it  is  to-day. 
But  the  coast  lies  so  low,  that  just  hard  b}^  the 
actual  mouth  of  the  Tiber,  the  nearness  of  the  sea 
can  only  be  guessed  by  the  reflection  of  the  waves 
in  the  atmosphere,  a  sort  of  pearly  halo,  trembling 
on  the  edge  of  the  sky.  At  present  I  am  inclined  to 
think  that  the  window  of  the  house  at  Ostia  was 
very  likely  turned  towards  the  vast  melancholy 
horizon  of  the  Agro  Romano.  "  We  passed  through, 
one  after  another,"  says  Augustin,  "  all  the  things 
of  a  material  order,  unto  heaven  itself."  Is  it  not 
natural  to  suppose  that  these  things  of  a  material 
order — these  shapes  of  the  earth  vv^ith  its  plantations, 
its  rivers,  towns,  and  mountains — were  under  their 
eyes  ?  The  bleak  spectacle  which  unrolled  before 
their  gaze  agreed,  at  all  events,  with  the  disposition 
of  their  souls. 

This  great  desolate  plain  has  nothing  oppressive, 
nothing  which  retains  the  eyes  upon  details  too 


234  SAINT   AUGUSTIN 

material.  The  colours  about  it  are  pale  and  slight, 
as  if  on  the  point  of  swooning  away.  Immense 
sterile  stretches,  fawn-coloured  throughout,  with 
here  and  there  shining  a  little  pink,  a  little  green  ; 
gorse,  furze-bushes  by  the  deep  banks  of  the  river, 
or  a  few  boschetti  with  dusty  leaves,  which  feebly 
stand  out  upon  the  blondness  of  the  soil.  To  the 
right,  a  pine  forest.  To  the  left,  the  undulations  of 
the  Roman  hills  expire  into  an  emptiness  infinitely 
sad.  Afar,  the  violet  scheme  of  the  Alban  moun- 
tains, with  veiled  and  dream-like  distances,  shape  in- 
definitely against  the  pearl  light,  limpid  and  serene, 
of  the  sky. 

Augustin  and  Monnica,  resting  on  the  window- 
ledge,  looked  forth.  Doubtless  it  was  towards 
evening,  at  the  hour  when  southern  windows  are 
thrown  open  to  the  cool  after  a  burning  day.  They 
looked  forth.  "  We  marvelled,"  says  Augustin, 
"  at  the  beauty  of  Thy  works,  O  my  God  !  .  .  ." 
Rome  was  back  there  beyond  the  hills,  with  its 
palaces,  its  temples,  the  gleam  of  its  gilding  and  its 
marbles.  But  the  far-off  image  of  the  imperial  city 
could  not  conquer  the  eternal  sadness  which  rises 
from  the  Agro.  An  air  of  funeral  loneliness  lay 
above  this  plain,  ready  to  be  engulfed  by  the 
creeping  shadows.  How  easy  it  was  to  break  free 
of  these  vain  corporeal  appearances  which  decom- 
posed of  themselves  !  "  Then,"  Augustin  resumes, 
"  we  soared  with  glowing  hearts  still  higher."  (He 
speaks  as  if  he  and  his  mother  were  risen  with 
equal  flight  to  the  vision.  It  is  more  probable  that 
he  was  drawn  up  by  Monnica,  long  since  familiar 
with  the  ways  of  the  spirit,  used  to  visions,  and 
to  mystic  talks  with  God.  .  .  .)     Where  was  this 


THE   ECSTASY   OF  SAINT  MONNICA    235 

God  ?  All  the  creatures,  questioned  by  their 
anguished  entreaty,  answered  :  Qucere  super  nos — 
"  Seek  above  us  !  "  They  sought  ;  they  mounted 
higher  and  higher  :  "  And  so  we  came  to  our  own 
minds,  and  passed  beyond  them  into  the  region  of 
unfailing  plenty,  where  Thou  feedest  Israel  for  ever 
with  the  food  of  truth.  .  .  .  And  as  we  talked,  and 
we  strove  eagerly  towards  this  divine  region,  by 
a  leap  with  the  whole  force  of  our  hearts,  we  touched 
it  for  an  instant.  .  .  .  Then  we  sighed,  we  fell  back, 
and  left  there  fastened  the  first  fruits  of  the  Spirit, 
and  heard  again  the  babble  of  our  own  tongues, 
this  mortal  speech  wherein  each  word  has  a  beginning 
and  an  ending." 

**  We  fell  back  !  "  The  marvellous  vision  had 
vanished.  But  a  great  silence  was  about  them, 
silence  of  things,  silence  of  the  soul.  And  they  said 
to  each  other  : 

"  If  the  tumult  of  the  flesh  were  hushed  ;  hushed 
these  shadows  of  earth,  sea,  sky ;  suppose  this 
vision  endured,  and  all  other  far  inferior  modes  of 
vision  were  taken  away,  and  this  alone  were  to 
ravish  the  beholder,  and  absorb  him,  and  plunge 
him  in  mystic  joy,  so  that  eternal  life  might  be  like 
this  moment  of  comprehension  which  has  made  us 
sigh  with  Love — might  not  that  be  the  fulfilment  of 
'  Enter  thou  into  the  joy  of  thy  Lord  '  ?  Ah,  when 
shall  this  be  ?  Shall  it  not  be,  O  my  God,  when 
we  rise  again  among  the  dead  .  .  .  ?  " 

Little  by  little  they  came  down  to  earth.  The 
dying  colours  of  the  sunset-tide  smouldered  into  the 
white  mists  of  the  Agro.  The  world  entered  into 
night.  Then  Monnica,  impelled  by  a  certain  presenti- 
ment, said  to  Augustin  : 


236  SAINT   AUGUSTIN 

"  My  son,  as  for  me,  I  find  no  further  pleasure  in 
life.  What  I  am  still  to  do,  or  why  I  still  linger  here, 
I  know  not.  .  .  .  There  was  only  one  thing  made 
me  want  to  tarry  a  little  longer  in  this  life,  that  I 
might  see  you  a  Christian  and  a  Catholic  before  I 
died.  My  God  has  granted  me  this  boon  far 
beyond  what  I  hoped  for.  So  what  am  I  doing 
here  ?  " 

She  felt  it  ;  her  work  was  done.  She  had  ex- 
hausted, as  Augustin  says,  all  the  hope  of  the 
century — consumpta  spe  scbcuU.  For  her  the  part- 
ing was  near.  This  ecstasy  was  that  of  one  d^dng, 
who  has  raised  a  corner  of  the  veil,  and  who  no 
longer  belongs  to  this  world. 

And,  in  fact,  five  or  six  days  later  she  fell  ill. 
She  had  fever.  The  climate  of  Ostia  bred  fevers, 
as  it  does  to-day,  and  it  was  alwa3'S  unsanitary  on 
account  of  all  the  foreigners  who  brought  in  every 
infection  of  the  Orient.  Furthermore,  the  weariness 
of  a  long  journey  in  summer  had  worn  out  this 
woman,  old  before  her  time.  She  had  to  go  to  bed. 
Soon  she  got  worse,  and  then  lost  consciousness. 
They  believed  she  w^as  in  the  agony.  They  all 
came  round  her  bed — Augustin,  his  brother  Navigius, 
Evodius,  the  two  cousins  from  Thagaste,  Rusticus, 
and  Lastidianus.  But  suddenly  she  shuddered, 
raised  herself,  and  asked  in  a  bewildered  way  : 

"  Where  was  I  ?  " 

Then,  seeing  the  grief  on  their  faces,  she  knew  that 
she  was  lost,  and  she  said  in  a  steady  voice  : 

"  You  will  bury  your  mother  here." 

Navigius,  frightened  by  this  sight  of  death, 
protested  with  all  his  affection  for  her  : 


THE   ECSTASY   OF  SAINT   MONNICA    237 

**  No.  You  will  get  well,  mother.  You  will  come 
home  again.    You  won't  die  in  a  foreign  land." 

She  looked  at  him  with  sorrowful  eyes,  as  if  hurt 
that  he  spoke  so  little  like  a  Christian,  and  turning 
to  Augustin : 

**  See  how  he  talks,"  she  said. 

And  after  a  silence,  she  went  on  in  a  firmer  voice, 
as  if  to  impress  on  her  sons  her  final  wishes  : 

"  Lay  this  body  where  you  will,  and  be  not 
anxious  about  it.  Only  I  beseech  you,  remember 
me  at  the  altar  of  God,  wherever  you  are." 

That  was  the  supreme  renunciation.  How  could 
an  African  woman,  so  much  attached  to  her  country, 
agree  to  be  buried  in  a  stranger  soil  ?  Pagan 
notions  were  still  very  strong  in  this  community, 
and  the  place  of  burial  was  an  important  considera- 
tion. Monnica,  like  all  other  widows,  had  settled 
upon  hers.  At  Thagaste  she  had  had  her  place 
prepared  beside  her  husband  Patricius.  And  here 
now  she  appeared  to  give  that  up.  Augustin's 
companions  were  astonished  at  such  abnegation. 
As  for  himself,  he  marvelled  at  the  completeness  of 
the  change  worked  in  his  mother's  soul  by  Grace. 
And  as  he  thought  over  all  the  virtues  of  her  life, 
the  strength  of  her  faith — from  that  moment,  he 
had  no  doubt  that  she  was  a  saint. 

She  still  lingered  for  some  time.  Finally,  on  the 
ninth  day  of  her  illness,  she  died  at  the  age  of 
fifty-six. 

Augustin  closed  her  eyes.  A  great  sorrow  surged 
into  his  heart.  And  yet  he  who  was  so  quick  to 
tears  had  the  courage  not  to  cry.  .  .  .  Suddenly 
a  noise  of  weeping  rose  in  the  room  of  death  :  it 
was  the  young  Adeodatus,   who  lamented  at  the 


238  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

sight  of  the  corpse.  He  sobbed  in  such  a  heart- 
broken way  that  those  who  were  there,  demorahzed 
by  the  distress  of  it,  were  obhged  to  rebuke  him.  This 
struck  Augustin  so  deeply,  that  many  years  after- 
wards the  broken  sound  of  this  sobbing  still  haunted 
his  ears.  *'  Methought,"  he  says,  "  that  it  was  my 
own  childish  soul  which  thus  broke  out  in  the 
weeping  of  my  son."  As  for  him,  with  the  whole 
effort  of  his  reason  struggling  against  his  heart,  he  only 
wanted  to  think  of  the  glory  which  the  saint  had 
just  entered  into.  His  companions  felt  likewise. 
Evodius  caught  up  a  psalter,  and  before  Monnica's 
body,  not  yet  cold,  he  began  to  chant  the  Psalm, 
"  My  song  shall  be  of  mercy  and  judgment ;  unto 
Thee,  O  Lord,  will  I  sing."  All  who  were  in  the 
house  took  up  the  responses. 

In  the  meantime,  while  the  layers-out  were  pre- 
paring the  corpse  for  burial,  the  brethren  drew 
Augustin  into  another  room.  His  friends  and  rela- 
tions stood  round  him.  He  consoled  the  others  and 
himself.  He  spoke,  as  the  custom  was,  upon  the 
deliverance  of  the  faithful  soul  and  the  happiness 
which  is  promised.  They  might  have  imagined  that 
he  had  no  sense  of  grief,  "  But  in  Thy  hearing,  O 
my  God,  where  none  of  them  could  hear,  I  was 
chiding  the  softness  of  my  heart,  and  holding  back 
the  tide  of  sorrow.  .  .  .  Alas  !  well  did  I  know  what 
I  was  choking  down  in  my  heart." 

Not  even  at  the  church,  where  the  sacrifice  was 
offered  for  Monnica's  soul,  nor  at  the  cemetery 
before  the  coffin,  did  he  weep.  From  a  sense  of 
Christian  seemliness,  he  feared  to  scandalize  his 
brethren  by  imitating  the  desolation  of  the  pagans 
and  of  those  who  die  without  hope.    But  this  very 


THE  ECSTASY   OF  SAINT  MONNICA    239 

effort  that  he  made  to  keep  back  his  tears  became 
another  cause  of  suffering.  The  day  ended  in  a  black 
sadness,  a  sadness  he  could  not  shake  off.  It  stifled 
him.  Then  he  remembered  the  Greek  proverb — 
"  The  bath  drives  away  sorrow ; "  and  he  deter- 
mined to  go  and  bathe.  He  went  into  the  tepi- 
darium  and  stretched  himself  out  on  the  hot  slab. 
Useless  remedy  !  '*  The  bitterness  of  my  trouble 
was  not  carried  from  my  heart  with  the  sweat  that 
flowed  from  my  limbs."  The  attendants  rolled  him 
in  warm  towels  and  led  him  to  the  resting-couch. 
Worn  out  by  tiredness  and  so  many  emotions,  he 
fell  into  a  heavy  sleep.  The  next  day,  upon  awaking, 
a  fresh  briskness  was  in  all  his  being.  Some  verses 
came  singing  into  his  memory  ;  they  were  the  first 
words  of  the  confident  and  joyous  hymn  of  St.  Am- 
brose : 

"  Creator  of  the  earth  and  sky, 
Ruling  the  firmament  on  high, 
Clothing  the  day  with  robes  of  light. 
Blessing  with  gracious  sleep  the  night, — 

That  rest  may  comfort  weary  men 
To  face  their  usual  toil  again, 
And  soothe  awhile  the  harassed  mind, 
And  sorrow's  heavy  load  unbind." 

Suddenly,  at  the  word  sorrow,  the  thought  of  his 
dead  mother  came  back  to  him,  with  the  regret  for 
that  kind  heart  he  had  lost.  A  wave  of  despair  over- 
whelmed him.  He  flung  himself  sobbing  on  the  bed, 
and  at  last  wept  all  the  tears  he  had  pent  up  so  long. 


Ill 

THE   MONK  OF  THAGASTE 

ALMOST  a  year  went  by  before  Augustin  con- 
,  tinned  his  journey.  It  is  hard  to  account  for 
this  delay.  Why  should  he  thus  put  off  his  return 
to  Africa,  he  who  was  so  anxious  to  fly  the  world  ? 

It  is  likely  that  Monnica's  illness,  the  arrange- 
ments about  her  funeral,  and  other  matters  to 
settle,  kept  him  at  Ostia  till  the  beginning  of  winter. 
The  weather  became  stormy,  the  sea  dangerous. 
Navigation  was  regularly  interrupted  from  Novem- 
ber— sometimes  even  earlier,  from  the  first  days  of 
October,  if  the  tempests  and  the  equinox  were 
exceptionally  violent.  It  would  then  be  necessary 
to  wait  till  spring.  Besides,  word  came  that  the 
fleet  of  the  usurper  Maximus,  then  at  war  with 
Theodosius,  blockaded  the  African  coast.  Travel- 
lers ran  the  risk  of  being  captured  by  the  enemy. 
From  all  these  reasons,  Augustin  would  be  prevented 
from  sailing  before  the  end  of  the  following  summer. 
In  the  meantime,  he  went  to  live  in  Rome.  He 
employed  his  leisure  to  work  up  a  case  against  the 
Manicliees,  his  brethren  of  the  day  before.  Once  he 
had  adopted  Catholicism,  he  must  have  expected 
passionate  attacks  from  his  former  brothers  in 
rehgion.  To  close  their  mouths,  he  gathered  against 
them  an  elaborate  mass  of  documents,  bristling  with 
the  latest  scandals.     He  busied  himself  also  with  a 

240 


THE   MONK   OF  THAGASTE  241 

thorough  stud}^  of  their  doctrines,  the  better  to 
refute  them  :  in  him  the  dialectician  never  slept. 
Then,  when  he  had  an  opportunity,  he  visited  the 
Roman  monasteries,  studying  their  rule  and  organi- 
zation, so  as  to  decide  on  a  model  for  the  convent 
which  he  always  intended  to  establish  in  his  own 
country.  At  last,  he  went  back  to  Ostia  some  time 
in  August  or  September,  3S8,  where  he  found  a  ship 
bound  for  Carthage. 

Four  years  earlier,  about  the  same  time  of  year, 
he  had  made  the  same  voyage,  coming  the  opposite 
way.  He  had  a  calm  crossing ;  hardly  could  one 
notice  the  movement  of  the  ship.  It  is  the  season  of 
smooth  seas  in  the  Mediterranean.  Never  is  it  more 
etherial  than  in  these  summer  months.  The  vague 
blue  sky  is  confused  with  the  bleached  sea,  spread 
out  in  a  large  sheet  without  creases — liquid  and 
flexible  silk,  swept  by  quivering  amber  glow  and 
orange  saffron  when  the  sun  falls.  No  distinct  shape, 
only  strange  suffusions  of  soft  light,  a  pearl-like  haze, 
the  wistful  blue  reaching  away  indefinably. 

At  Carthage,  Augustin  had  grown  used  to  the 
magnificence  of  this  pageantry  of  the  sea.  Now,  the 
sea  had  the  same  appeased  and  gleaming  face  he  had 
seen  four  years  sooner.  But  how  much  his  soul  had 
since  been  changed  !  Instead  of  the  tumult  and 
falsehood  which  rent  his  heart  and  filled  it  with 
darkness,  the  serene  light  of  Truth,  and  deeper  than 
the  sea's  peace,  the  great  appeasement  of  Grace. 
Augustin  dreamed.  Far  off  the  iEolian  isles  were 
gloomed  in  the  impending  shadows,  the  smoky  crater 
of  Stromboli  was  no  more  than  a  black  point  circled 
by  the  double  blue  of  waves  and  sky.  So  the  remem- 
brance of  his  passions,  of  all  that  earlier  life,  sank 


242  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

under  the  triumphant  uprising  of  heavenly  peace. 
He  beheved  that  this  blissful  state  was  going  to 
continue  and  fill  all  the  hours  of  his  new  life,  and  he 
knew  of  nothing  so  sweet.  .  .  . 

This  time,  again,  he  was  mistaken  about  himself. 
Upon  the  thin  plank  of  the  boat  which  carried  him, 
he  did  not  feel  the  force  of  the  immense  element, 
asleep  now  under  his  feet,  but  quick  to  be  un- 
chained at  the  first  gust  of  wind ;  and  he  did  not 
feel  either  the  overflowing  energy  swelling  his  heart 
renewed  by  Grace — an  energy  which  was  going  to 
set  in  motion  one  of  the  most  complete  and  strenuous 
existences,  one  of  the  richest  in  thought,  charity, 
and  works  which  have  enlightened  history.  Think- 
ing only  of  the  cloister,  amidst  the  friends  who 
surrounded  him,  no  doubt  he  repeated  the  words 
of  the  Psalm :  "  Behold,  how  good  and  how  pleasant 
it  is  for  brethren  to  dwell  together  in  unity."  He 
pressed  the  hands  of  Alypius  and  Evodius,  and  tears 
came  to  his  eyes. 

The  sun  was  gone.  All  the  cold  waste  of  waters, 
forsaken  by  the  gleam,  blurred  gradualh^  in  vague 
anguish  beneath  the  fall  of  night. 

After  skirting  the  Sicilian  coasts,  they  arrived  at 
last  at  Carthage.  Augustin  did  not  linger  there  ; 
he  was  eager  to  see  Thagastc  once  more,  and  to 
retire  finally  from  the  world.  Favourable  omens 
drew  him  to  the  place,  and  seemed  to  hearten  him 
in  his  resolution.  A  dream  had  foretold  his  return 
to  his  former  pupil,  Elogius,  the  rhetorician.  He 
was  present,  too,  at  the  miraculous  cure  of  a  Carthage 
lawyer,  Innocentius,  in  whose  house  he  dwelt  with 
his  friends. 


THE   MONK   OF   THAGASTE  243 

Accordingly,  he  left  for  Thagaste  as  soon  as  he 
could.  There  he  made  himself  popular  at  once  by 
giving  to  the  poor,  as  the  Gospel  prescribed,  what 
little  remained  of  his  father's  heritage.  But  he  does 
not  make  clear  enough  what  this  voluntary  priva- 
tion exactly  meant.  He  speaks  of  a  house  and  some 
little  meadows — paucis  agellulis — that  he  seques- 
trated. Still,  he  did  not  cease  to  live  in  the  house 
all  the  time  he  was  at  Thagaste.  The  probability  is 
that  he  did  sell  the  few  acres  of  land  he  still  owned 
and  bestowed  the  product  of  the  sale  on  the  poor. 
As  to  the  house,  he  must  have  made  it  over  with 
the  outbuildings  to  the  Catholic  body  of  his  native 
town,  on  condition  of  keeping  the  usufruct  and  of 
receiving  for  himself  and  his  brethren  the  necessi- 
ties of  life.  At  this  period  many  pious  persons  ■ 
acted  in  this  way  when  they  gave  their  property 
to  the  Church.  Church  goods  being  unseizable,  and 
exempt  from  taxation,  this  was  a  roundabout  way 
of  getting  the  better  of  fiscal  extortion,  whether  in 
the  shape  of  arbitrary  confiscations,  or  eviction  by 
force  of  armxS.  In  any  case,  such  souls  as  were  tired 
of  the  world  and  longing  for  repose,  found  in  these 
bequests  an  heroic  method  of  saving  themselves  the 
trouble  of  looking  after  a  fortune  or  a  landed  estate. 
When  these  fortunes  and  lands  were  extensive,  the 
generous  donors  felt,  we  are  told,  an  actual  relief  in 
getting  rid  of  them. 

This  financial  question  settled,  Augustin  took  up 
the  task  of  turning  the  house  into  a  monastery,  like 
those  he  had  seen  at  Rome  and  Milan.  His  son 
Adeodatus,  his  friends  Alypius  and  Evodius,  Severus, 
who  became  Bishop  of  Mile  via,  shared  his  solitude. 
But  it  is  certain  that  he  had  other  solitaries  with 


244  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

him  whom  he  alludes  to  in  his  letters.  Their  rule 
was  as  yet  a  little  easy,  no  doubt.  The  brothers  of 
Thagaste  were  not  confined  in  a  cloister.  They  were 
simply  obliged  to  fasts,  to  a  special  diet,  to  prayers 
and  meditations  in  common. 

In  this  half-rustic  retreat  (the  monastery  was 
situated  at  the  gates  of  the  town)  Augustin  was 
happy  :  he  had  at  last  realized  the  project  he  had 
had  so  long  at  heart.  To  enter  into  himself,  pra}^ 
above  all,  to  study  the  Scripture,  to  fathom  even  its 
most  obscure  places,  to  comment  it  with  the  fervour 
and  piety  which  the  African  of  all  times  has  brought 
to  what  is  written  down — it  seemed  to  him  that  he 
had  enough  there  to  fill  all  the  minutes  of  his  life. 
But  no  man  can  teach,  lecture,  discuss,  write,  during 
twenty  years,  in  vain.  However  much  Augustin 
might  be  converted,  he  remembered  the  school  at 
Thagaste,  just  as  he  did  at  Cassicium.  Still,  it  was 
necessary  to  finish  with  this  sort  of  thing  once  for 
all.  The  new  monk  made  what  may  be  called  his 
will  as  a  professor. 

He  finished,  at  this  time,  or  revised  his  school 
1/  treatises,  which  he  had  begun  at  Milan,  comprising 
j  all  the  liberal  arts — grammar,  dialectic,  rhetoric, 
geometry,  arithmetic,  philosophy,  music.  Of  all 
these  books  he  only  finished  the  first,  the  treatise  on 
grammar.  The  others  were  only  summaries,  and 
are  now  lost.  On  the  other  hand,  we  have  still  the 
six  books  on  music,  likewise  begun  at  Milan,  which 
he  finished,  almost  as  an  amusement,  at  Thagaste. 
They  are  dialogues  between  himself  and  his  pupil, 
the  poet  Licentius,  upon  metre  and  scansion.  But 
we  know  from  himself  that  he  intended  to  make  this 
book  longer,  and  to  write  a  second  part  upon  melod}', 


THE   MONK   OF   THAGASTE  245 

that  is  to  say,  music,  properly  so  called.  He  never 
found  the  time  :  "  Once,"  he  says,  "  the  burthen  of 
ecclesiastical  affairs  was  placed  on  my  shoulders, 
all  these  pleasant  things  slipped  from  my  hands." 

Thus,  the  monk  Augustin  only  rests  from  prayer 
and  meditation  to  study  music  and  poetry.  He  has 
thought  it  necessary  to  excuse  himself.  "  In  all 
that,"  says  he,  **  I  had  but  one  purpose.  For,  as  I  did 
not  wish  to  pluck  away  too  suddenly  either  young 
men,  or  those  of  another  age,  on  whom  God  had 
bestowed  good  wits,  from  ideas  of  the  senses  and 
carnal  literature,  things  it  is  very  hard  for  them  not  to 
he  attached  to,  I  have  tried  by  reasoning  lessons  to 
turn  them  little  by  little,  and  by  the  love  of  unchang- 
ing truth,  to  attach  them  to  God,  sole  master  of  all 
things.  .  .  .  He  who  reads  these  books  will  see  that 
if  I  have  touched  upon  the  poets  and  grammarians, 
'twas  more  by  the  exigency  of  the  journey  than  by 
any  desire  to  settle  among  them.  .  .  .  Such  is  the 
life  I  have  chosen  to  walk  with  the  feeble,  not  being 
very  strong  myself,  rather  than  to  hurl  myself  out 
on  the  void  with  wings  still  half-fledged.  ..." 

Here  again,  how  human  all  that  is,  and  wise — 
yes,  and  modest  too.  Augustin  has  no  whit  of  the 
fanatic  about  him.  No  straighter  conscience  than 
his,  or  even  more  persistent  in  uprooting  error. 
But  he  knows  what  man  is,  that  life  here  below  is  a 
voyage  among  other  men  weak  as  himself,  and  he 
fits  in  with  the  needs  of  the  voyage.  Oh,  yes,  no 
doubt,  for  the  Christian  who  has  arrived  at  supreme 
renunciation — what  is  poetry,  what  is  knowledge, 
**  what  is  everything  that  is  not  eternal  ?  "  But 
this  carnal  literature  and  science  are  so  many  steps 
of  a  height  proportionate  to  our  feebleness,  to  lead 


246  SAINT   AUGUSTIN 

us  imperceptibly  to  the  conceptual  world.  As  a 
prudent  guide  of  souls,  Augustin  did  not  wish  to 
make  the  ascent  too  rapidl}^  As  for  music,  he  has 
still  more  indulgence  for  that  than  for  any  of  the 
other  arts,  for  '*  it  is  by  sounds  that  we  best  perceive 
the  power  of  numbers  in  every  variety  of  movement, 
and  their  study  thus  leads  us  gradually  to  the  closest 
and  highest  secrets  of  truth,  and  discovers  to  those 
who  love  and  seek  it  the  divine  Wisdom  and  Provi- 
dence in  all  things.  .  .  ."  He  is  always  coming  back 
to  it — to  this  music  he  loves  so  much  ;  he  comes 
back  to  it  in  spite  of  himself.  Later,  in  great 
severity,  he  will  reproach  himself  for  the  pleasure  he 
takes  in  the  liturgical  chants,  but  nevertheless  the 
old  instinct  will  remain.  He  was  born  a  musician. 
He  will  remain  one  to  his  last  gasp. 

If  he  did  not  break  completely  with  profane  art 
and  letters  at  this  present  moment  of  his  life,  his 
chief  reasons  were  of  a  practical  order.  Still  another 
object  may  be  discerned  in  these  educational 
treatises — namely,  to  prove  to  the  pagans  that  one 
may  be  a  Christian  and  yet  not  be  a  barbarian  and 
ignorant.  Augustin's  position  in  front  of  his  adver- 
saries is  very  strong  indeed.  None  of  them  can 
attempt  to  cope  with  him  either  in  breadth  of  know- 
ledge, or  in  happy  versatility,  or  in  plenitude  of 
intellectual  gifts.  He  had  the  entire  heritage  of  the 
ancient  world  between  his  hands.  Well  might  he 
say  to  the  pagans  :  "  What  you  admire  in  your 
orators  and  philosophers,  I  have  made  my  own. 
Behold  it  !  On  my  lips  recognize  the  accent  of  your 
orators.  .  .  .  Well,  all  that,  which  you  deem  so 
high,  I  despise.  The  knowledge  of  this  world  is 
nothing  without  the  wisdom  of  Christ." 


THE   MONK   OF   THAGASTE  247 

Of  course,  Augustin  has  paid  the  price  of  this  all- 
round  knowledge — too  far-reaching,  perhaps,  at 
certain  points.  He  has  often  too  much  paraded  his 
knowledge,  his  dialectic  and  oratorical  talents. 
What  matters  that,  if  even  in  this  excess  he  aims 
solely  at  the  welfare  of  souls — to  edify  them  and  set 
them  aglow  with  the  fire  of  his  charity?  At  Thagaste, 
he  disputes  with  his  brethren,  with  his  son  Adeo- 
datus.  He  is  always  the  master — he  knows  it  ;  but 
what  humility  he  puts  into  this  dangerous  part  ! 
The  conclusion  of  his  book.  The  Master,  which  he 
wrote  then,  is  that  all  the  words  of  him  who  teaches 
are  useless,  if  the  hidden  Master  reveal  not  the  truth 
to  him  who  listens. 

So,  under  his  ungainly  monk's  habit,  he  continues 
his  profession  of  rhetorician.  He  has  come  to 
Thagaste  with  the  intention  of  retiring  from  the 
world  and  living  in  God ;  and  here  he  is  disputing, 
lecturing,  writing  more  than  ever.  The  world  pur- 
sues him  and  occupies  him  even  in  his  retreat.  He 
says  to  himself  that  down  there  at  Rome,  at  Car- 
thage, at  Hippo,  there  are  men  speaking  in  the 
forums  or  in  the  basilicas,  whispering  in  secret 
meetings,  seducing  poor  souls  defenceless  against 
error.  These  impostors  must  be  immediately  un- 
masked, confounded,  reduced  to  silence.  With  all 
his  heart  Augustin  throws  himself  into  this  work  at 
which  he  excels.  Above  all,  he  attacks  his  old 
friends  the  Manichees.  .  .  .  He  wrote  many  tracts 
against  them.  From  the  animosity  he  put  into  these, 
may  be  judged  to  what  extent  Manicheeism  filled 
his  thoughts,  and  also  the  progress  of  the  sect  in 
Africa. 

This  campaign  was  even  the  cause  of  a  complete 


248  SAINT   AUGUSTIN 

change  in  his  way  of  writing.  With  the  object  of 
reaching  the  plainest  sort  of  people,  he  began  to 
emplo}/  the  popular  language,  not  recoiling  before  a 
solecism,  when  the  solecism  appeared  to  him  in- 
dispensable to  explain  his  thought.  This  must  have 
been  a  cruel  mortification  for  him.  In  his  very  latest 
writings  he  made  a  point  of  shewing  that  no  elegance 
of  language  was  unknown  to  him.  But  his  real 
originality  is  not  in  that.  When  he  writes  the  fine 
style,  his  period  is  heavy,  entangled,  often  obscure. 
On  the  other  hand,  nothing  is  more  lively,  clear  and 
coloured,  and,  as  we  say  to-day,  more  direct,  than 
the  familiar  language  of  his  sermons  and  certain  of 
his  treatises.  This  language  he  has  really  created. 
He  wanted  to  clarify,  comment,  give  details,  and  he 
felt  how  awkward  classical  Latin  is  to  decompose 
ideas  and  render  shades.  And  so,  in  a  popular  Latin, 
already  very  close  to  the  Romance  languages,  he 
has  thrown  out  the  plan  of  analytical  prose,  the 
instrument  of  thought  of  the  modern  West. 

Not  only  did  he  battle  against  the  heretics,  but 
his  restless  friendship  continually  scaled  the  walls  of 
his  cell  to  fly  to  the  absent  ones  dear  to  his  heart. 
He  feels  that  he  must  expand  to  his  friends,  ^nd  make 
them  sharers  in  his  meditations  :  this  nei  ^as  man, 
in  poor  health,  spends  a  part  of  his  nighis  meditat- 
ing. The  argument  he  has  hit  upon  in  last  night's 
insomnia — his  friends  must  be  told  that  !  He  heaps 
his  letters  on  them.  He  writes  to  Nebridius,  to 
Romanianus,  to  Paulinus  of  Nola  ;  to  people  un- 
known and  celebrated,  in  Africa,  Italy,  Spain,  and 
Palestine.  A  time  will  come  when  his  letters  will  be 
real  encyclicals,  read  throughout  Christendom.  He 
writes  so  much  that  he   is   often  short   of   paper. 


THE   MONK   OF   THAGASTE  249 

He  has  not  tablets  enough  to  put  down  his  notes.  He 
asks  Romanianus  to  give  him  some.  His  beautiful , 
tablets,  the  ivory  ones,  are  used  up  ;  he  has  used  the 
last  one  for  a  ceremonial  letter,  and  he  asks  his 
friend's  pardon  for  writing  to  him  on  a  wretched 
bit  of  vellum. 

Besides  all  that,  he  interests  himself  in  the  affairs 
of  his  fellow-townsmen.  Augustin  is  a  personage 
at  Thagaste.  The  good  folk  of  the  free-town  are 
well  aware  that  he  is  eloquent,  that  he  has  a  far- 
reaching  acquaintance,  and  that  he  has  great 
influence  in  high  quarters.  They  ask  for  his  protec- 
tion and  his  interference.  It  is  even  possible  that 
they  obliged  him  to  defend  them  in  the  courts.  They 
were  proud  of  their  Augustin.  And  as  they  were 
afraid  that  some  neighbouring  town  might  steal 
away  their  great  man,  they  kept  a  guard  round  his 
house.  They  prevented  him  from  shewing  himself 
too  much  in  the  neighbourhood.  Augustin  himself 
agreed  with  this,  and  lived  retired  as  far  as  he  could, 
for  he  was  afraid  they  would  make  him  a  bishop  or 
priest  in  spite  of  himself.  In  those  days  that  was  al 
danger  incurred  by  all  Christians  who  were  rich  or 
had  talent.  The  rich  gave  their  goods  to  the  poor 
when  L.  y  took  orders.  The  men  of  talent  defended 
the  interests  of  the  community,  or  attracted  opulent 
benefactors.  And  because  of  all  these  reasons,  the 
needy  or  badly  managed  churches  stalked  as  a  preyj 
the  celebrated  Augustin. 

In  spite  of  this  supervision,  this  unremitting  rush 
of  business,  the  work  of  all  kinds  which  he  under- 
took, he  experienced  at  Thagaste  a  peace  which  he 
was  never  to  find  again.  One  might  say  that  he 
pauses  and  gathers  together  all  his  strength  before 


250  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

the  great  exhausting  labour  of  his  apostolate.  In 
this  Numidian  country,  so  verdant  and  cool,  where 
a  thousand  memories  of  childhood  encompassed 
him,  where  he  was  not  able  to  take  a  step  without 
encountering  the  ever-living  image  of  his  mother, 
he  soared  towards  God  with  more  confidence.  He 
who  sought  in  the  things  of  sense  ladder-rungs 
whereby  to  mount  to  spiritual  realities,  still  turned 
kindly  eyes  on  the  natural  scene.  From  the  windows 
of  his  room  he  saw  the  forest  pines  rounding  their 
heads,  like  little  crystal  goblets  with  stems  slim  and 
thin.  His  scarred  chest  breathed  in  deliciously  the 
resinous  breath  of  the  fine  trees.  He  listened  like  a 
musician  to  the  orchestra  of  birds.  The  changing 
scenes  of  country  life  always  attracted  him.  It  is 
now  that  he  wrote  :  "  Tell  me,  does  not  the  night- 
ingale seem  to  you  to  modulate  her  voice  delight- 
fully ?  Is  not  her  song,  so  harmonious,  so  suave,  so 
well  attuned  to  the  season,  the  very  voice  of  the 
spring  ?  .  .  ." 


IV 

AUGUSTIN   A   PRIEST 

THIS  halt  did  not  last  long.    Soon  was  going  to 
begin  for  Augustin  the  time  of  tribulation,  that 
of  his  struggles  and  apostolic  journeys. 

And  first,  he  must  mourn  his  son  Adeodatus,  that 
young  man  who  seemed  destined  to  such  great 
things.  It  is  indeed  most  probable  that  the  young 
monk  died  at  Thagaste  during  the  three  years  that 
his  father  spent  there.  Augustin  was  deeply  grieved  ; 
but,  as  in  the  case  of  his  mother's  death,  he  mastered 
his  sorrow  by  all  the  force  of  his  Christian  hope.  No 
doubt  he  loved  his  son  as  much  as  he  was  proud  of 
him.  It  will  be  remembered  what  words  he  used  to 
speak  of  this  youthful  genius,  whose  precocity  fright- 
ened him.  Little  by  little  his  grief  quietened  down, 
and  in  its  place  came  a  mild  resignation.  Some  years 
later  he  will  write  about  Adeodatus  :  "  Lord,  early 
didst  Thou  cut  off  his  life  from  this  earth,  but  I 
remember  him  without  a  shadow  of  misgiving.  My 
remembrance  is  not  mixed  with  an}^  fear  for  his 
boyhood,  or  the  youth  he  was,  or  the  man  he  would 
have  been."  No  fear  !  What  a  difference  between 
this  and  the  habitual  feelings  of  the  Jansenists,  who 
believed  themselves  his  disciples  !  While  Augustin 
thinks  of  his  son's  death  with  a  calm  and  grave  joy 
which  he  can  scarce  hide,  those  of  Port  Royal  could 
only  think  in  trembling  of  the  judgment  of  God. 

251 


252  SAINT   AUGUSTIN 

Their  faith  did  not  much  resemble  the  luminous  and 
confident  faith  of  Augustin.  For  him,  salvation  is 
the  conquest  of  joy. 

At  Thagaste  he  lived  in  joy.  Every  morning  in 
awaking  before  the  forest  pines,  glistening  with  the 
dews  of  the  morning,  he  might  well  say  with  a  full 
heart  :  ''  My  God,  give  me  the  grace  to  live  here 
under  the  shades  of  Thy  peace,  while  awaiting  that 
of  Thy  Paradise."  But  the  Christians  continued  to 
watch  him.  It  was  to  the  interest  of  a  number  of 
people  that  this  light  should  not  be  hid  under  a 
bushel.  Perhaps  a  snare  was  deliberately  laid  for 
him.  At  an}^  rate,  he  was  imprudent  enough  to 
come  out  of  his  retreat  and  travel  to  Hippo.  He 
thought  he  might  be  safe  there,  because,  as  the  town 
had  a  bishop  already,  they  would  not  have  any 
excuse  to  get  him  consecrated  in  spite  of  himself. 

An  inhabitant  of  Hippo,  a  clerk  of  the  Imperial 
Ministry  of  the  Interior,  begged  his  spiritual  assist- 
ance. Doubts,  he  maintained,  still  delayed  him  on  the 
way  to  an  entire  conversion.  Augustin  alone  could 
help  him  to  get  clear  of  them.  So  Augustin,  counting 
already  on  a  new  recruit  for  the  Thagaste  monastery, 
went  over  there  at  the  request  of  this  official. 

Now,  if  there  was  a  bishop  at  Hippo  (a  certain 

Valerius),  priests  were  lacking.     Furthermore,  Val- 

!   erius  was  getting  on  in  years.    Originally  Greek,  he 

knew  Latin  badly,   and  not  a  word  of  Punic — a 

great   hindrance   for   him   in   his   duties   of  judge, 

administrator,    and   catechist.     The   knowledge   of 

;   the  two  languages  was  indispensable  to  an  ecclesi- 

'    astic  in  such  a  country,  where  the  majority  of  the 

rural  population  spoke  only  the  old  Carthaginian 

idiom.     All  this  proves  to  us  that  Catholicism  was 


AUGUSTIN   A   PRIEST  253 

in  bad  shape  in  the  diocese  of  Hippo.  Not  only  was 
there  a  lack  of  priests,  but  the  bishop  was  a  foreigner, 
httle  famiUar  with  African  customs.  There  was  a 
general  demand  for  a  native  to  take  his  place — one 
young,  active,  and  well  enough  furnished  with  learn- 
ing to  hold  his  own  against  the  heretics  and  the 
schismatics  of  the  party  of  Donatus,  and  also 
sufficiently  able  to  watch  over  the  interests  of  the 
Church  at  Hippo,  and  above  all,  to  make  it  prosper- 
ous. Let  us  not  forget  that  at  this  time,  in  the  eyes 
of  a  crowd  of  poor  wretches,  Christianity  was  first 
and  foremost  the  religion  which  gave  out  bread. 
Even  in  those  earl}^  days,  the  Church  did  its  best  to 
solve  the  eternal  social  question. 

While  Augustin  was  at  Hippo,  Valerius  preached 
a  sermon  in  the  basilica  in  which,  precisely,  he 
deplored  this  lack  of  priests  the  community  suffered 
from.  Mingled  with  the  congregation,  Augustin 
listened,  sure  that  he  would  be  unrecognized.  But 
the  secret  of  his  presence  had  leaked  out.  People 
pointed  to  him  while  the  bishop  was  preaching. 
The  next  thing  was  that  some  furious  enthusiasts 
seized  hold  of  him  and  dragged  him  to  the  foot  of 
the  episcopal  chair,  yelling  : 

"  Augustin  a  priest  !  Augustin  a  priest  !  " 
Such  were  the  democratic  ways  of  the  Church  in 
those  days.  The  inconveniences  are  plain  enough. 
What  is  certain  is,  that  if  Augustin  had  resisted,  he 
might  have  lost  his  life,  and  that  the  bishop  would 
have  provoked  a  riot  in  refusing  him  the  priesthood. 
In  Africa,  religious  passions  are  not  to  be  trifled  with, 
especialty  when  they  are  exasperated  b}^  questions 
of  profit  or  politics.  In  his  heart,  the  bishop  was 
dehghted   with   this   brutal  capture  which   gained 


254  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

him  the  distinction  of  such  a  well-known  fellow- 
worker.  There  and  then  he  ordained  the  Thagaste 
monk.  And  so,  as  Augustin's  pupil,  Possidius,  the 
future  Bishop  of  Guelma,  puts  it,  "  This  shining  lamp, 
which  sought  the  darkness  of  solitude,  was  placed 
upon  the  lamp-stand.  ..."  Augustin,  w^ho  saw  the 
finger  of  God  in  this  adventure,  submitted  to  the 
popular  will.  Nevertheless,  he  was  in  despair,  and 
he  wept  at  the  change  they  were  forcing  on  him. 
Then,  some  of  those  present,  mistaking  the  signifi- 
cance of  his  tears,  said  to  console  him  : 

"  Yes,  you  are  right.  The  priesthood  is  not  good 
enough  for  your  merits.  But  you  may  be  certain 
that  you  will  be  our  bishop." 

Augustin  well  knew  all  that  the  crowd  meant  by 
that,  and  what  it  expected  of  its  bishop.  He  who 
only  thought  of  leaving  the  world,  grew  frightened 
at  the  practical  cares  he  would  have  to  take  over. 
And  the  spiritual  side  of  his  jurisdiction  frightened 
him  no  less.  To  speak  of  God  !  Proclaim  the  word 
of  God  !  He  deemed  himself  unworthy  of  so  high 
a  privilege.  He  was  so  ill-prepared  !  To  remedy 
this  fault  of  preparation,  as  well  as  he  could,  he 
desired  that  he  might  be  given  a  little  leisure  till  the 
following  Easter.  In  a  letter  addressed  to  Valerius, 
and  no  doubt  intended  to  be  made  public,  he  humbly 
set  forth  the  reasons  why  he  asked  for  delay.  They 
were  so  apposite  and  so  creditable,  that  very  likely 
the  bishop  yielded.  The  new  priest  received  per- 
mission to  retire  to  a  country  house  near  Hippo. 
His  flock,  who  did  not  feel  at  all  sure  of  their  shepherd, 
would  not  have  let  him  go  too  far  off. 

He  took  up  his  duties  as  soon  as  possible.  Little 
by  little  he  became,  to  all  intents,  the  coadjutor  of 


AUGUSTIN   A   PRIEST  255 

the  bishop,  who  charged  him  with  the  preaching 
and  the  baptism  of  catechumens.  These  were  the 
two  most  important  among  the  episcopal  preroga- 
tives. The  bishops  made  a  point  of  doing  these 
things  themselves.  Certain  colleagues  of  Valerius 
even  grew  scandalized  that  he  should  allow  a  simple 
priest  to  preach  before  him  in  his  own  church.  But 
soon  other  bishops,  struck  by  the  advantages  of 
this  innovation,  followed  the  example  of  Valerius,  and 
allowed  their  clerks  to  preach  even  in  their  presence. 
The  priest  of  Hippo  did  not  lose  his  head  among  so 
many  honours.  He  felt  chiefly  the  perils  of  them,  and 
he  regarded  them  as  a  trial  sent  by  God.  "  I  have 
been  forced  into  this,"  he  said,  "  doubtless  in  punish- 
ment of  my  sins  ;  for  from  what  other  motive  can 
I  think  that  the  second  place  at  the  helm  should  be 
given  to  me — to  me  who  do  not  even  know  how  to 
hold  an  oar.  .  .  ." 

Meanwhile,  he  had  not  relinquished  his  purpose 
of  monastic  life.  Though  a  priest,  he  meant  to 
remain  a  monk.  It  was  heart-breaking  for  him  to 
be  obliged  to  leave  his  monastery  at  Thagaste.  He 
spoke  of  his  regret  to  Valerius,  who,  perceiving  the 
usefulness  of  a  convent  as  a  seminary  for  future 
priests,  gave  him  an  orchard  belonging  to  the 
church  of  Hippo,  that  he  might  found  a  new  com- 
munity there.  So  was  established  the  monastery 
which  was  going  to  supply  a  great  number  of  clerks 
and  bishops  to  all  the  African  provinces. 

Among  the  ruins  of  Hippo,  that  old  Roman  and 
Phoenician  city,  they  search  for  the  place  where 
Augustin's  monastery  stood,  without  much  hope  of 
ever  finding  it.  Some  have  thought  to  locate  it 
upon  that  hill  where  the  water  brought  from  the 


256  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

near  mountains  by  an  aqueduct  used  to  pour  into 
immense  reservoirs,  and  where  to-day  rises  a  new 
basilica  which  attracts  all  eyes  out  at  sea.  Behind 
the  basilica  is  a  convent  where  the  Little  Sisters  of 
the  Poor  lodge  about  a  hundred  old  people.  So  is 
maintained  among  the  African  Mussulmans  the  re- 
membrance of  the  grand  Christian  marabout.  One 
might  possibly  wish  to  see  there  a  building  more 
in  the  pure  and  quiet  taste  of  antiquity.  But  after 
all,  the  piety  of  the  intention  is  enough.  This 
hospital  serves  admirably  to  call  up  the  memory  of 
the  illustrious  bishop  who  was  charity  itself.  As 
for  the  basilica,  Africa  has  done  all  she  can  to  make 
it  worthy  of  him.  She  has  given  her  most  precious 
marbles,  and  one  of  her  fairest  landscapes  as  a 
frame. 

It  is  chiefly  in  the  evening,  in  the  closing  dusk, 
that  this  landscape  reveals  all  its  special  charm  and 
its  finer  values.  The  roseate  glow  of  the  setting 
sun  throws  into  sharp  relief  the  black  profile  of  the 
mountains,  which  command  the  Seybouse  valley. 
Under  the  mustering  shadows,  the  pallid  river  winds 
slowly  to  the  sea.  The  gulf,  stretching  limitless, 
shines  like  a  slab  of  salt  strangel}^  bespangled.  In 
this  atmosphere  without  mists,  the  sharp  outlines  of 
the  coast,  the  dense  movelessness  of  the  aspect,  has 
an  indescribable  effect.  It  is  like  a  hitherto  un- 
known and  virginal  revelation  of  the  earth.  Then 
the  stars  bloom  out,  with  a  flame,  an  hallucinating 
palpability.  Charles's  Wain,  burning  low  on  the 
gorges  of  the  Edough,  seems  like  a  golden  waggon 
rolling  through  the  fields  of  Heaven.  A  deep  peace 
settles  upon  farmland  and  meadow  country,  only 
broken  by  a  watch-dog's  bark  now  and  then.  .  .  . 


AUGUSTIN   A   PRIEST  257 

But  it  matters  not  which  spot  is  chosen  in  the  sur- 
roundings of  Hippo  to  place  Augustin's  monastery, 
the  view  will  be  equally  beautiful.  From  all  parts 
of  the  plain,  mounded  by  heaps  of  ruins,  the  sea  can 
be  seen — a  wide  bay  circled  in  soft  bland  curves, 
like  at  Naples.  All  aroimd,  an  arena  of  mountains 
— the  green  ravines  of  the  Edough  and  its  wooded 
slopes.  Along  the  surbased  roads  rise  the  great 
sonorous  pines,  and  through  them  wanders  the 
aeolian  complaint  of  the  sea-winds.  Blue  of  the 
sea,  blue  of  the  sky,  noble  foliage  of  Italy's  ancient 
groves — it  is  one  of  Lamartine's  landscapes  under 
a  more  burning  sun.  The  gaiety  of  the  mornings 
there  is  a  physical  luxury  for  heart  and  eyes, 
when  the  new-born  light  laughs  upon  the  painted 
cupolas  of  the  houses,  and  dark  blue  veils  float 
between  the  walls,  glaring  white,  of  the  steep 
streets. 

Among  the  olives  and  orange-trees  of  Hippo, 
Augustin  must  have  seen  happy  days  pass  by,  as 
at  Thagaste.  The  rule  he  had  given  the  convent, 
which  he  himself  obeyed  like  any  one  else,  was  neither 
too  slack  nor  too  strict — in  a  word,  such  as  it  should 
be  for  m.en  who  have  lived  in  the  culture  of  letters 
and  works  of  the  mind.  There  was  no  affectation  of 
excessive  austerit}^  Augustin  and  his  monks  wore 
very  simple  clothes  and  shoes,  but  suitable  for  a 
bishop  and  his  clerks.  Like  laymen,  they  wore  the 
byrrhus,  a  garment  with  a  hood,  which  seems  very 
like  the  ancestor  of  the  Arab  burnous.  To  keep 
an  even  line  between  daintiness  and  negligence  in 
costume,  to  have  no  exaggeration  in  anything,  is 
what  Augustin  aimed  at.  The  poet  Rutilius  Numa- 
tianus,   who  about  that    time  was    attacking    the 


258  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

sordid  and  culture-hating  monks  with  sombre  irony, 
would  have  had  a  chance  to  admire  a  restraint  and 
decorum  in  the  Hippo  monastery  which  recalled  what 
was  best  in  the  manners  of  the  ancient  world.  At 
table,  a  like  moderation.  Vegetables  were  generally 
provided,  and  sometimes  meat  when  any  one  was 
sick,  or  guests  arrived.  They  drank  a  little  wine, 
contrary  to  the  regulations  of  St.  Jerome,  who 
condemned  wine  as  a  drink  for  devils.  When  a 
monk  infringed  the  rule,  his  share  of  the  wine  was 
stopped. 

Through  some  remains  of  fastidious  habits  in 
Augustin,  or  perhaps  because  he  had  nothing 
else,  the  table  service  he  used  himself  was  silver. 
On  the  other  hand,  the  pots  and  dishes  were  of 
earthenware,  or  wood,  or  common  alabaster.  Augus- 
tin, who  was  very  temperate  in  eating  and  drinking, 
seemed  at  table  to  pay  attention  only  to  what  was 
being  read  or  talked  about.  He  cared  very  little 
what  he  ate,  provided  the  food  was  not  a  stimulant 
to  lubricity.  He  used  to  say  to  those  Christians 
who  paraded  a  Pharisaic  severity  :  "It  is  the  pure 
heart  which  makes  pure  food."  Then,  with  his 
constant  desire  for  charity,  he  prohibited  all  spiteful 
gossip  in  the  conversation  in  the  refectory.  In  those 
times  of  religious  struggle,  the  clerics  ferociously 
blackened  each  other's  characters.  xA-Ugustin  caused 
to  have  written  on  the  walls  a  distich,  which  ran 
thus  : 

"  He  who  takes  pleasure  in  slandering  the  life  of  the  absent, 
Should  know  he  is  unworthy  to  sit  at  this  table." 

"  One  day,"  says  Possidius,  "  some  of  his  inti- 
mate friends,  even  other  bishops,  having  forgotten 
this  sentence,  he  reproached  them  warmly,  and  very 


AUGUSTIN   AjPRIEST  259 

much  perturbed,  he  cried  out  that  he  was  going  to 
remove  those  verses  from  the  refectory,  or  rise  from 
table  and  withdraw  to  his  cell.  I  was  present  with 
many  others  when  this  happened." 

It  was  not  only  slanderous  talk  or  interior  dis- 
sensions which  troubled  Augustin's  peace  of  mind. 
He  combined  the  duties  of  priest,  of  a  head  of  a 
convent,  and  of  an  apostle.  He  had  to  preach, 
instruct  the  catechumens,  battle  against  the  dis- 
affected. The  town  of  Hippo  was  very  unruly,  full 
of  heretics,  schismatics,  pagans.  Those  of  the  party 
of  Donatus  were  triumphant,  driving  the  Catholics 
from  their  churches  and  lands.  When  Augustin 
came  into  the  country,  Catholicism  was  very  low. 
And  then  the  ineradicable  Manichees  continued  to 
recruit  proselytes.  He  never  stopped  writing  tracts, 
disputing  against  them,  overwhelming  them  under 
the  close  logic  of  his  arguments.  At  the  request  of 
the  Donatists  themselves,  he  had  an  argument  with 
one  of  their  priests,  a  certain  Fortunatus,  in  the 
baths  of  Sossius  at  Hippo.  He  reduced  this  man 
to  silence  and  to  flight.  Not  in  the  least  discouraged 
were  the  Manichees  :    they  sent  another  priest. 

If  the  enemies  of  the  Church  shewed  themselves 
stubborn,  Augustin's  own  congregation  were  singu- 
larly turbulent,  hard  to  manage.  The  weakness  of 
old  Valerius  must  have  allowed  a  good  many  abuses 
to  creep  into  the  community.  Ere  long  the  priest 
of  Hippo  had  a  foretaste  of  the  difficulties  which 
awaited  him  as  bishop. 

Following  the  example  of  Ambrose,  he  undertook 
to  abolish  the  custom  of  feasts  in  the  basilicas  and 
on  the  tombs  of  the  m.artj/rs.  This  was  a  survival  of 
paganism,  of  which  the  festivals  included  gluttonous 


26o  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

eating  and  orgies.  At  every  solemnity,  and  they 
were  frequent,  the  pagans  ate  in  the  courts  and 
under  the  porticoes  around  the  temples.  In  Africa, 
above  all,  these  public  repasts  gave  an  opportunity 
for  repugnant  scenes  of  stuffing  and  drunkenness. 
As  a  rule,  the  African  is  very  sober  ;  but  when  he 
does  let  himself  go  he  is  terrible.  This  is  quite 
easily  seen  to-da}^  in  the  great  Muslem  feasts,  when 
the  rich  distribute  broken  bits  of  meat  to  the  poor 
of  their  district.  As  soon  as  these  people,  used  to 
drink  water  and  to  eat  a  little  boiled  rice,  have 
tasted  meat,  or  drunk  only  one  cup  of  wine,  there 
is  no  holding  them  :  there  are  fights,  stabbing 
matches,  a  general  brawl  in  the  hovels.  Just  pic- 
ture this  popular  debauch  in  full  blast  in  the  ceme- 
teries and  the  courts  of  the  basihcas,  and  it  will  be 
understood  why  Augustin  did  his  best  to  put  an 
end  to  such  scandals. 

For  this  purpose,  he  joined  hands  first  of  all 
with  his  bishop,  Valerius,  and  then  with  the  Primate 
of  Carthage,  Aurelius,  who  shall  be  henceforth  his 
firmest  support  in  his  struggle  against  the  schis- 
matics. 

During  Lent,  the  subject  fitting  in  naturally  with 
the  season,  he  spoke  against  these  pagan  orgies ;  and 
this  gave  rise  to  a  good  deal  of  discontent  outside. 
Easter  went  by  without  trouble.  But  the  dsy  after 
the  Ascension,  the  people  of  Hippo  were  used  to 
celebrate  what  they  called  "  the  Joy-day,"  by  a 
traditional  good  feed  and  drink.  The  day  before, 
which  was  the  religious  festival,  Augustin  intrepidly 
spoke  against  *'  the  Joy-day."  They  interrupted 
the  preacher.  Some  of  them  shouted  that  as  much 
was   done   at    Rome   in   St.    Peter's   basihca.      At 


AUGUSTIN   A   PRIEST  261 

Carthage,  they  danced  round  the  tomb  of  St.  Cyp- 
rian. To  the  shrilUng  of  flutes,  amid  the  dull  blows 
of  the  gongs,  mimes  gave  themselves  up  to  obscene 
contortions,  while  the  spectators  sang  to  the  clapping 
of  their  hands.  .  .  .  Augustin  knew  all  about  that. 
He  declared  that  these  abominations  might  have 
been  tolerated  in  former  times  so  as  not  to  discourage 
the  pagans  from  becoming  converts  ;  but  that 
henceforth  the  people,  altogether  Christian,  should 
give  them  up.  In  the  end,  he  spoke  with  such  touch- 
ing eloquence  that  the  audience  burst  into  tears. 
He  believed  he  had  won. 

The  next  day  it  was  all  to  do  over  again.  Agita- 
tors had  worked  among  the  crowd  to  such  an  extent 
that  a  riot  was  feared.  Nevertheless,  Augustin,  pre- 
ceded by  his  bishop,  entered  the  basilica  at  the 
hour  of  service.  At  the  same  moment  the  Donatists 
were  banqueting  in  their  church,  which  was  quite 
near.  Through  the  walls  of  their  own  church  the 
Catholics  heard  the  noise  of  this  carouse.  It  re- 
quired the  coadjutor's  most  urgent  remonstrances  to 
keep  them  from  imitating  their  neighbours.  The 
last  murmurs  died  down,  and  the  ceremony  ended 
with  the  singing  of  the  sacred  hymns. 

Augustin  had  carried  the  position.  But  the  con- 
flict had  got  to  the  point  that  he  had  to  threaten 
the  people  with  his  resignation,  and,  as  he  wrote  to 
Alypius,  "  to  shake  out  on  them  the  dust  from  his 
clothes."  All  this  promised  very  ill  for  the  future. 
He  who  already  considered  the  priesthood  as  a  trial, 
saw  with  terror  the  bishopric  drawing  near. 


THE    FIFTH    PART 

THE  APOSTLE  OF  PEACE  AND  OF  CATHOLIC 

UNITY 


Die  eis  ista,  ut  plorent  .  .  .  et  sic  eos  rape  tecum  ad  Deum  : 
quia  de  spiritu  ejus  haec  dicis  eis,  si  dicis  ardens  igne  caritatis. 

"Tell  them  this,  O  my  soul,  that  they  may  weep  .  .  .  and  thus 
carry  them  up  with  thyself  to  God  ;  because  by  His  Spirit  thou 
sayest  these  things,  if  Thou  speakest  burning  with  the  flame  of 
charity."  Confessions^  IV,  12. 


THE   BISHOP   OF   HIPPO 

IN  his  monastery,  Augustin  was  still  spied  upon 
by  the  neighbouring  Churches,  who  wanted  him 
for  their  bishop.  They  would  capture  him  on  the 
first  opportunity.  The  old  Valerius,  fearing  his 
priest  would  be  taken  unawares,  urged  him  to  hide 
himself.  But  he  knew  b^^  the  verj^  case  of  Augustin, 
forced  into  the  priesthood  in  spite  of  himself,  that 
the  greatest  precautions  are  useless  against  those 
determined  to  gain  their  ends  by  any  means.  It 
would  be  safest  to  anticipate  the  danger. 

He  determined  therefore  to  share  the  bishopric 
with  Augustin,  to  have  him  consecrated  during  his 
own  lifetime,  and  to  indicate  him  as  his  successor. 
This  was  against  the  African  usage,  and  what  was 
more,  against  the  Canons  of  the  Council  of  Nice — 
though  it  is  true  that  Valerius,  like  Augustin  him- 
self, was  unaware  of  this  latter  point.  But  surely 
the  rule  could  be  waived  in  view  of  the  exceptional 
merits  of  the  priest  of  Hippo.  The  old  bishop 
began  by  sounding  Aurelius,  the  Primate  of 
Carthage,  and  when  he  was  satisfied  as  to  the 
agreement  and  support  of  this  high  personage,  he 
took  the  opportunity  of  a  religious  solemnity  to 
make  known  his  intentions  to  the  people. 

Some  of  the  neighbouring  bishops — Megalius, 
Bishop  of  Guelma  and  Primate  of  Numidia,  among 

265 


266  SAINT   AUGUSTIN 

them — being  gathered  at  Hippo  to  consecrate  a 
new  bishop,  Valerius  announced  pubHcly  in  the 
basiUca  that  he  wished  Augustin  to  be  consecrated 
at  the  same  ceremony.  This  had  been  the  wish  of 
his  people  for  a  long  time.  Really,  in  demanding 
this  honour  for  his  priest,  the  old  bishop  did  no 
more  than  follow  the  wish  of  the  public.  Im- 
mediately, his  words  were  received  with  cheers. 
The  faithful  with  loud  shouts  demanded  Augustin's 
consecration. 

Megalius  alone  objected.  He  even  made  himself 
the  voice  of  certain  calumnies,  so  as  to  have  the 
candidate  put  aside  as  unworthy.  There  is  nothing 
astonishing  in  such  an  attitude.  This  Megalius  was 
old  (he  died  a  short  time  after),  and,  like  all  old  men, 
he  took  the  gloomiest  view  of  innovations.  Already, 
in  the  face  of  settled  custom,  had  Valerius  granted 
Augustin  the  right  to  preach  in  his  presence.  And 
see  now,  by  a  new  sinking,  he  was  attempting  to 
place  two  bishops  at  once  in  the  see  of  Hippo  ! 
Whatever  this  young  priest's  talents  might  be, 
enough  had  been  done  for  him — a  recent  convert 
into  the  bargain,  and,  what  was  still  more  serious, 
a  refugee  from  the  Manicheans.  What  was  not 
related  about  the  abominations  committed  in  the 
mysteries  of  those  people  ?  Just  how  far  had 
Augustin  dipped  into  them  ?  They  snarled  against 
him  everywhere  at  Hippo,  and  at  Carthage  too, 
where  he  had  compromised  himself  by  his  excessive 
zeal ;  Catholics  and  Donatists  alike  gossiped.  Mega- 
lius, a  punctilious  defender  of  discipline  and  the 
hierarchy,  no  doubt  gathered  up  these  malevolent 
rumours  with  pleasure.  He  used  them  as  an  excuse 
for    making    Augustin    mark    timiC,    so    to    speak. 


THE   BISHOP   OF   HIPPO  267 

Commonplace  people  always  feel  a  secret  delight 
in  humiliating  to  the  common  rule  those  whom  they 
can  feel  are  beings  of  a  different  quality  from  them- 
selves. 

One  of  the  slanders  set  abroad  about  Valerius' 
priest,  Megalius  seems  to  have  believed.  He 
allowed  himself  to  be  persuaded  that  Augustin 
had  given  a  philtre  to  a  woman,  one  of  his  penitents, 
whom  he  wished  to  possess.  It  was  then  the  fashion 
among  the  pious  to  exchange  eulogies,  or  bits  of  holy 
bread,  to  signify  a  spiritual  communion.  Augustin 
was  said  to  have  mixed  certain  magic  potions  with 
some  of  these  breads  and  offered  them  hypocritically 
to  the  woman  he  was  in  love  with.  This  accusation 
started  a  big  scandal,  and  the  remembrance  of  it 
persisted  long,  because  five  or  six  years  later  the 
Donatist  Petilian  was  still  repeating  it. 

Augustin  cleared  himself  victoriously.  Megalius 
avowed  his  mistake.  He  did  better  :  not  only  did 
he  apologize  to  him  he  had  slandered,  but  he  solemnly 
asked  forgiveness  from  his  fellow-bishops  for  having 
misled  them  upon  false  rumours.  It  is  probable  that 
some  time  during  the  inquiry  he  had  got  to  know 
Valerius'  coadjutor  better.  Augustin's  charm,  taken 
with  the  austerity  of  his  life,  acted  upon  the  vexed 
old  man  and  altered  his  views.  Be  that  so  or  not,  it 
was  at  any  rate  by  Megalius,  Bishop  of  Guelma 
and  Primate  of  Numidia,  that  Augustin  was  conse- 
crated Bishop  of  Hippo. 

He  was  in  consternation  over  his  rise.  He  has 
said  it  again  and  again.  We  may  take  his  word  for 
it.  Yet  the  honours  and  advantages  of  the  episco- 
pate were  then  so  considerable  that  his  enemies 
were  able  to  describe  him  as  an  ambitious  m^an. 


268  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

Nothing  could  agree  less  with  his  character.  In  his 
heart,  Augustin  only  wished  to  live  in  quiet.  Since 
his  retreat  at  Cassicium,  fortune  he  had  given  up, 
as  well  as  literary  glory.  His  sole  wish  was  to  live 
in  pondering  the  divine  truths,  and  to  draw  nearer 
to  God.  Videte  et  gusiate  quam  mitis  sit  Dominus — 
"  O  taste  and  see  that  the  Lord  is  good."  This 
perhaps,  of  the  whole  Bible,  is  the  verse  he  liked 
best,  which  answered  best  to  the  close  desire  of  his 
soul ;  and  he  quotes  it  oftenest  in  his  sermons.  Then, 
to  study  the  Holy  Writings,  scan  the  least  syllables 
of  them,  since  all  truth  lies  there — well,  a  whole  life 
is  not  too  much  for  such  labour  as  that  !  And  to 
do  it,  one  should  sever  all  ties  with  the  world,  take 
refuge  forbiddingly  in  the  cloister. 

But  this  sincere  Christian  analysed  himself  too 
skilfully  not  to  perceive  that  he  had  a  dangerous 
tendency  to  isolation.  He  took  too  much  pleasure 
in  cutting  himxself  off  from  the  society  of  mankind 
to  enshroud  himself  in  study  and  meditation.  He 
who  acknowledged  a  secret  tendency  to  the  Epi- 
curean indolence — was  he  going  to  live  a  life  of  the 
dilettante  and  the  self-indulgent  under  cover  of  hoH- 
ness  ?  Alone  could  action  save  him  from  selfishness. 
Others  doubtless  fulfilled  the  laws  of  charity  in 
praying,  in  mortifying  themselves  for  their  brethren. 
But  when,  like  him,  a  man  has  exceptional  faculties 
of  persuasion  and  eloquence,  such  vigour  in  dialectics, 
such  widespread  culture,  such  power  to  bring  to 
naught  the  wrong — would  it  not  be  insulting  to  God 
to  let  such  gifts  lie  idle,  and  a  serious  failure  in 
charity  to  deprive  his  brethren  of  the  support  of 
such  an  engine  ? 

Besides  that,  he  well  knew  that  no  man  draws 


THE   BISHOP  OF  HIPPO  269 

near  to  truth  without  a  purified  heart.  Might  not 
his  passions,  which  were  so  violent,  begin  to  torment 
him  again  after  this  respite  with  greater  frenzy  than 
before  his  conversion  ?  Against  that,  too,  action 
was  the  main  antidote.  In  the  duties  of  the  bishopric 
he  saw  a  means  of  asceticism — a  kind  of  courageous 
purification.  He  would  load  himself  of  his  own  will 
with  so  many  anxieties  and  so  much  work  that  he 
would  have  no  time  left  to  listen  to  the  insidious  voice 
of  his  *'old  friends."  Could  he  manage  to  silence 
them  at  once  ?  This  unheard-of  grace — would  it  be 
granted  to  him  ?  Or  would  not  rather  the  struggle 
continue  in  the  depths  of  his  conscience  ?  What 
comes  out  as  certain  is  that  those  terrible  passions 
which  turned  his  youth  upside  down,  nevermore 
play  any  part  in  his  life.  From  the  moment  he  fell 
on  his  knees  under  the  fig-tree  at  Milan,  his  sinful 
heart  is  a  dead  heart.  He  has  been  freed  from 
almost  all  the  weaknesses  of  the  old  nature,  not 
only  from  its  vices  and  carnal  affections,  but  from 
its  most  pardonable  lapses — save,  perhaps,  some  old 
sediment  of  intellectual  and  literary  vanity. 

His  books,  at  the  first  glance,  shew  us  him  no 
more  save  as  the  doctor,  and  already  the  saint. 
What  is  seen  at  once  is  an  entirely  bare  intelligence, 
an  entirely  pure  heart,  fired  only  by  the  divine  love. 
And  yet  the  affectionate  and  tender  heart  which 
his  had  been,  always  warms  his  discussions  and  his 
most  abstract  exegesis.  It  does  not  take  long  to 
feel  the  heat  of  them,  the  power  of  pouring  forth 
emotion.  Augustin  takes  no  heed  of  that.  Of 
himself  he  no  longer  thinks  ;  he  no  longer  belongs  to 
himself.  If  he  has  accepted  the  episcopate,  it  is  so 
as  to  give  himself  altogether  to  the  Church,  to  be 


270  SAINT   AUGUSTIN 

all  things  to  all  men.  He  is  the  man-word,  the  man- 
pen,  the  sounding-board  of  the  truth.  He  becomes 
the  man  of  the  miserable  crowds  which  the  Saviour 
covered  with  His  pity.  He  is  theirs,  to  convince 
them  and  cure  them  of  their  errors.  He  is  a  machine 
which  works  without  ever  stopping  for  the  greater 
glory  of  Christ.  Bishop,  pastor,  leader  of  souls — he 
has  no  desire  for  anything  else. 
A  But  it  was  a  heavy  labour  for  this  intellectual, 
who  till  then  had  lived  only  among  books  and 
ideas,  The  day  after  his  consecration,  he  must  have 
regarded  it  with  more  terror  than  ever.  During  his 
nights  of  insomnia,  or  at  the  recreation  hour  in  the 
monastery  garden,  he  thought  over  it  with  great 
distress.  His  eyes  wide  open  in  the  darkness  of  his 
cell,  he  sought  to  define  a  theory  upon  the  nature 
and  origin  of  the  soul ;  or  else,  at  the  fall  of  day, 
he  saw  between  the  olive  branches  "  the  sea  put 
on  fluctuating  shades  like  veils  of  a  thousand 
colours,  sometimes  green,  a  green  of  infinite  tints  ; 
sometimes  purple  ;  blue  sometimes.  ..."  And  his 
soul,  easily  stirred  to  poetry,  at  once  arose  from 
these  material  splendours  to  the  invisible  region  of 
ideas.  Then,  immediately,  he  caught  himself  up  : 
it  was  not  a  question  of  all  that  !  He  said  to  him- 
self that  he  was  henceforth  the  bishop  Augustin, 
that  he  had  charge  of  souls,  that  he  must  work  for 
the  needs  of  his  flock.  He  would  have  to  struggle 
in  a  combat  without  a  moment's  respite.  Thereupon 
he  arranged  his  plans  of  attack  and  defence.  With 
a  single  glance  he  gauged  the  huge  work  before  him. 
A  crushing  work,  truly  !  He  was  Bishop  of  Hippo, 
but  a  bishop  almost  without  a  flock,  in  comparison 
with  the  rival  community  of  Donatists.    The  bishop 


THE   BISHOP  OF   HIPPO  271 

of  the  dissentients,  Proculeianus,  boasted  that  he 
was  the  true  representative  of  orthodoxy,  and  as  he 
had  on  his  side  the  advantage  of  numbers,  he  cer- 
tainly cut  a  much  greater  figure  in  the  town  than  the 
successor  of  Valerius,  with  all  his  knowledge  and  all 
his  eloquence.  The  schismatics'  church,  as  we  have 
seen,  was  quite  near  the  Catholic  church.  Their  noise 
interfered  with  Augustin's  sermons.  Possibly  the 
situation  had  become  slightly  better  in  Hippo  since 
the  edict  of  Theodosius.  But  it  was  not  so  long  ago 
that  those  of  the  Donatist  party  had  the  upper  hand. 
A  little  before  the  arrival  of  the  new  bishop,  the 
Donatist  clergy  forbade  their  faithful  to  bake  bread 
for  Catholics.  A  fanatical  baker  had  even  refused 
a  Catholic  deacon  who  was  his  landlord.  These 
schismatics  believed  themselves  strong  enough  to 
put  those  who  did  not  belong  to  them  under  interdict. 

The  rout  of  Catholicism  appeared  to  be  an  accom- 
plished fact  from  one  end  to  the  other  of  Africa. 
Quite  recently  a  mere  fraction  of  the  Donatist  party 
had  been  able  to  send  three  hundred  and  ten  bishops 
to  the  Council  of  Bagai,  who  were  to  judge  the 
recalcitrants  of  their  own  sect.  Among  these 
bishops,  the  terrible  Optatus  of  Thimgad  became 
marked  on  account  of  his  bloody  zeal,  rambling 
round  Numidia  and  even  the  Proconsulate  at  the 
head  of  armed  bands,  burning  farms  and  villas,  re- 
baptizing  the  Catholics  by  main  force,  spreading 
terror  on  all  sides. 

Augustin  knew  all  this,  and  when  he  sought  help 
from  the  local  authorities  he  was  obliged  to  acknow- 
ledge sadly  that  there  was  no  support  to  be  expected 
from  Count  Gildo,  who  had  tyrannized  over 
Carthage   and   Africa  for  nearly   ten  years.     This 


272  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

Gildo  was  a  native,  a  Moor,  to  whom  the  ministers 
of  the  young  Valentinian  II  had  thought  it  a  good 
stroke  of  pohcy  to  confide  the  government  of  the 
province.  Knowing  the  weakness  of  the  Empire,  the 
Moor  only  thought  of  cutting  out  for  himself  an  inde- 
pendent principality  in  Africa.  He  openly  favoured 
Donatism,  which  was  the  most  numerous  and  in- 
fluential party.  The  Bishop  of  Thimgad,  Optatus, 
swore  only  by  him,  regarding  him  as  his  master  and 
his  *'  god/'  In  consequence,  he  was  called  "  the 
Gildonian." 

Against  such  enemies,  the  Imperial  authority 
could  onty  act  irregularly.  Augustin  was  well  aware 
of  it.  He  knew  that  the  Western  Empire  was  in  a 
critical  position.  Theodosius  had  just  died,  in  the 
midst  of  war  with  the  usurper  Eugenius.  The  Bar- 
barians, who  made  up  the  greater  part  of  the 
Roman  armies,  shewed  themselves  more  and  more 
threatening.  Alaric,  entrenched  in  the  Peloponnesus, 
was  getting  ready  to  invade  Italy.  However,  the 
all-powerful  minister  of  the  young  Honorius,  the 
half-Barbarian  Stilicho,  did  his  best  to  conciliate 
the  Catholics,  and  assured  them  that  he  would  con- 
tinue the  protection  they  had  had  from  Theodosius. 
Augustin  therefore  turned  to  the  central  power. 
It  alone  could  bring  about  a  little  order  in  the 
provinces — and  then,  besides,  the  new  emperors 
were  firmly  attached  to  the  defence  of  Catholicism. 
The  Catholic  Bishop  of  Hippo  did  his  best,  accord- 
ingly, to  keep  on  good  terms  with  the  repre- 
sentatives of  the  Metropolitan  Government — the 
proconsuls  ;  the  propraetors ;  the  counts ;  and  the 
tribunes,  or  the  secretaries,  sent  by  the  Emperor 
as  Government  commissioners. 


THE   BISHOP  OF  HIPPO  273 

There  was  no  suspicion  of  flattery  in  his  attitude, 
no  idolatry  of  power.  At  Milan,  Augustin  had  been 
near  enough  to  the  Court  to  know  what  the  Im- 
perial functionaries  were  worth.  Now,  he  simply 
adapted  himself  as  well  as  he  could  to  the  needs  of 
the  moment.  And  with  all  that,  he  could  have 
wished  in  the  depths  of  his  heart  that  this  power 
were  stronger,  so  as  to  give  the  Church  more 
effective  support.  This  cultured  man,  brought  up 
in  the  respect  of  the  Roman  majesty,  was  by  in- 
stinct a  faithful  servant  of  the  Csesars.  A  man  who 
held  to  authority  and  tradition,  he  maintained  that 
obedience  is  due  to  princes  :  "  There  is  a  general 
agreement,"  he  said,  **  of  human  society  to  obey  its 
Kings."  In  one  of  his  sermons  he  compares  thought, 
which  commands  the  body,  to  the  Emperor  seated 
upon  his  throne,  and  from  the  depths  of  his  palace 
dictating  orders  which  set  the  whole  Empire  moving 
— a  purely  ideal  image  of  the  sovereign  of  that  time, 
but  one  which  pleased  his  Latin  imagination.  Alas  ! 
Augustin  had  no  illusions  about  the  effect  of  Im- 
perial edicts  ;  he  knew  too  well  how  little  they  were 
regarded,  especially  in  Africa. 

So  he  could  hardly  count  upon  Government  sup- 
port for  the  defence  of  Catholic  unity  and  peace. 
He  found  he  must  trust  to  himself;  and  all  his 
strength  was  in  his  intelligence,  in  his  charity,  in  his 
deeply  compassionate  soul.  Most  earnestly  did  he 
wish  that  Catholicism  might  be  a  religion  of  love, 
open  to  all  the  nations  of  the  earth,  even  as  its 
Divine  Founder  Himself  had  wished.  A  glowing 
and  dominating  intelligence,  charity  which  never 
tired — those  were  Augustin's  arms.  And  they  were 
enough.    These  quaUties  gave  him  an  overwhelming 

T 


274  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

superiority  over  all  the  men  of  his  time.  Among 
them,  pagans  or  Christians,  he  looks  like  a  colossus. 
From  what  a  height  he  crushes,  not  only  the  pro- 
fessors who  had  been  his  colleagues,  such  as  Nec- 
tarius  of  Guelma  or  Maximus  of  Madaura,  but  the 
most  celebrated  writers  of  his  time — Symmachus, 
for  instance,  and  Ammianus  Marcellinus.  After 
reading  a  treatise  of  Augustin's,  one  is  astounded 
by  the  intellectual  meagreness  of  these  last  pagans. 
The  narrowness  of  their  mind  and  platitude  of 
thought  is  a  thing  that  leaves  one  aghast.  Even 
the  illustrious  Apuleius,  who  belonged  to  the  golden 
age  of  African  literature,  the  author  of  The  Doctrine 
of  Plato,  praises  philosophy  and  the  Supreme  Being 
in  terms  which  recall  the  professions  of  faith  of  the 
chemist  and  druggist,  Homais,  in  Madame  Bovary. 

Nor  among  those  who  surrounded  Augustin,  his 
fellow-bishops,  was  there  one  fit  to  be  compared 
with  him,  even  at  a  distance.  Except  perhaps 
Nebridius,  his  dearest  friends,  Alypius,  Severus,  or 
Evodius,  are  merely  disciples,  not  to  sa}^  servants 
of  his  thought.  Aurelius,  Primate  of  Carthage,  an 
energetic  administrator,  a  firm  and  upright  charac- 
ter, if  he  is  not  on  Augustin's  level,  is  at  any  rate 
capable  of  understanding  and  supporting  him.  The 
others  are  decent  men,  like  that  Samsucius,  Bishop  of 
Tours,  very  nearly  illiterate,  but  full  of  good  sense 
and  experience,  and  on  this  ground  consulted  re- 
spectfully by  his  colleague  of  Hippo.  Or  else  they 
are  plotters,  given  to  debauch,  engaged  in  business, 
like  Paulus,  Bishop  of  Cataqua,  who  became  involved 
in  risky  speculations,  swindled  the  revenue,  and 
by  his  expensive  way  of  life  ruined  his  diocese. 
Others,    on    the    Donatist    side,    are    mere    swash- 


THE  BISHOP  OF  HIPPO  275 

bucklers,  half -brigands,  half-fanatics,  like  the  Gil- 
donian  Optatus,  Bishop  of  Thimgad,  a  manifesta- 
tion in  advance  of  the  Mussulman  marabout  who 
preached  the  holy  war  against  the  Catholics,  raid- 
ing, killing,  burning,  converting  by  sabre  blows  and 
bludgeoning. 

Amid  these  insignificant  or  violent  men,  Augustin 
will  endeavour  to  realize  to  the  full  the  admirable 
type  of  bishop,  at  once  spiritual  father,  protector, 
and  support  of  his  people.  He  had  promised  him- 
self to  sacrifice  no  whit  of  his  ideal  of  Christian 
perfection.  As  bishop,  he  will  remain  a  monk,  as  he 
did  during  his  priesthood.  Beside  the  monastery 
established  in  Valerius'  garden,  where  it  is  im- 
possible to  receive  properly  his  guests  and  visitors, 
he  will  start  another  in  the  episcopal  residence. 
He  will  conform  to  the  monastic  rule  as  far  as  his 
duties  allow.  He  will  pray,  study  the  Scriptures, 
define  dogmas,  refute  heresies.  x\t  the  same  time, 
he  means  to  neglect  nothing  of  his  material  work. 
He  has  mouths  to  feed,  property  to  look  after,  law- 
cases  to  examine.  He  will  labour  at  all  that.  For 
this  mystic  and  theorist  it  means  a  never-ceasing 
immolation. 

First,  to  give  the  poor  their  daily  bread.  Like 
all  the  communities  of  that  time.  Hippo  main- 
tained a  population  of  beggars.  Often  enough, 
the  diocesan  cash-box  was  empty.  Augustin  was 
obliged  to  hold  out  the  hand,  to  deliver  from  the 
height  of  his  pulpit  pathetic  appeals  for  charity. 
Then,  there  are  hospitals  to  be  built  for  the  sick, 
a  lodging-house  for  poor  wanderers.  The  bishop 
started  these  institutions  in  houses  bequeathed  to 
the  church  of  Hippo.     For  reasons  of  economy,  he 


276  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

thought  better  not  to  build.  That  would  overload 
his  budget.  Next  came  the  greatest  of  all  his  cares 
— the  administration  of  Church  property.  To  in- 
crease this  property,  he  stipulated  that  his  clergy 
should  give  up  all  they  possessed  in  favour  of  the 
community,  thus  giving  the  faithful  an  example  of 
voluntary  poverty.  He  also  accepted  gifts  from 
private  persons.  But  he  also  often  refused  these — 
for  example,  the  bequest  of  a  father  or  mother,  who, 
in  a  moment  of  anger,  disinherited  their  children. 
He  did  not  wish  to  profit  by  the  bad  feelings  of 
parents  to  plunder  orphans.  On  another  side,  he 
objected  to  engage  the  Church  in  suits  at  law  with 
the  exchequer  upon  receiving  certain  heritages. 
When  a  business  man  at  Hippo  left  to  the  diocese 
his  share  of  profits  in  the  service  of  boats  for  carry- 
ing Government  stores,  Augustin  came  to  the  con- 
clusion that  it  would  be  better  to  refuse.  In  case 
of  shipwreck,  they  would  be  obliged  to  make  good 
the  lost  corn  to  the  Treasury,  or  else  to  put  the 
captain  and  surviving  sailors  to  the  torture  to  prove 
that  the  crew  was  not  responsible  for  the  loss  of  the 
ship.    Augustin  would  not  hear  tell  of  it. 

"Is  it  fit,"  he  said,  *'  that  a  bishop  should  be  a 
shipowner  ?  .  .  .  A  bishop  a  torturer  ?  Oh,  no  ; 
that  does  not  agree  at  all  with  a  servant  of  Jesus 
Christ." 

The  people  of  Hippo  did  not  share  his  views. 
They  blamed  Augustin's  scruples.  They  accused 
him  of  compromising  the  interests  of  the  Church. 
One  day  he  had  to  explain  himself  from  the  pulpit  : 

"  Well  I  know,  my  brothers,  that  you  often  say 
between  yourselves  :  *  Why  do  not  people  give 
anything  to  the  Church  of  Hippo  ?     Why  do  not 


THE   BISHOP  OF  HIPPO  277 

the  dying  make  it  their  heir  ?  The  reason  is  that 
Bishop  Augustin  is  too  easy  ;  he  gives  all  back  to 
the  children  ;  he  keeps  nothing  !  '  I  acknowledge 
it,  I  only  accept  gifts  which  are  good  and  pious. 
Whoever  disinherits  his  son  to  make  the  Church 
his  heir,  let  him  find  somebody  willing  to  accept  his 
gifts.  It  is  not  I  who  will  do  it,  and  by  God's  grace, 
I  hope  it  will  not  be  anybody.  .  .  .  Yes,  I  have  re- 
fused many  legacies,  but  I  have  also  accepted  many. 
Need  I  name  them  to  you  ?  I  will  give  only  one 
instance.  I  accepted  the  heritage  of  Julian.  Why  ? 
Because  he  died  without  children.  ..." 

The  listeners  thought  that  their  bishop  really 
put  too  fine  a  point  on  things. 

They  further  reproached  him  with  not  knowing 
how  to  attract  and  flatter  the  rich  benefactors. 
Augustin  would  not  allow,  either,  that  they  had  any 
right  to  force  a  passing  stranger  to  receive  the  priest- 
hood and  consequently  to  give  up  his  goods  to  the 
poor.  All  this  really  was  very  wise,  not  only  accord- 
ing to  the  spirit  of  the  Gospel,  but  according  to 
human  prudence.  If  Augustin,  for  the  sake  of  the 
good  fame  of  his  Church,  did  not  wish  to  incur  the 
accusation  of  grasping  and  avarice,  he  dreaded 
nothing  so  much  as  a  law-case.  To  accept  lightly 
the  gifts  and  legacies  offered  was  to  lay  himself  open 
to  expensive  pettifogging.  Far  better  to  refuse  than 
to  lose  both  his  money  and  reputation.  So  were 
reconciled,  in  this  man  of  prayer  and  meditation, 
practical  good  sense  with  the  high  disinterestedness 
of  the  Christian  teaching. 

The  bishop  was  disinterested  ;  his  people  were 
covetous.  The  people  of  those  times  wished  the 
Church  to  grow  rich,  because  they  were  the  first  to 


278  SAINT   AUGUSTIN 

profit  by  its  riches.  Now  these  riches  were  princi- 
pally in  houses  and  land.  The  diocese  of  Hippo 
had  to  deal  with  many  houses  and  immense  fundi, 
upon  which  lived  an  entire  population  of  artisans 
and  freed-men,  agricultural  labourers,  and  even 
art-workers — smelters,  embroiderers,  chisellers  on 
metals.  Upon  the  Church  lands,  these  small  people 
were  protected  from  taxes  and  the  extortions  of 
the  revenue  officers,  and  no  doubt  they  found  the 
episcopal  government  more  fatherly  and  mild  than 
the  civil. 

Augustin,  who  had  made  a  vow  of  poverty  and 
given  his  heritage  to  the  poor,  became  by  a  cruel 
irony  a  great  landowner  as  soon  as  he  was  elected 
Bishop  of  Hippo.  Doubtless  he  had  stewards 
under  him  to  look  after  the  property  of  the  diocese. 
This  did  not  save  him  from  going  into  details  of 
management  and  supervising  his  agents.  He  heard 
the  complaints,  not  only  of  his  own  tenants,  but 
also  of  those  who  belonged  to  other  estates  and 
were  victimized  by  dishonest  bailiffs.  Anyhow,  we 
have  a  thousand  signs  to  shew  that  no  detail  of 
country  life  was  unfamiliar  to  him. 

On  horseback  or  muleback,  he  rode  for  miles 
through  the  country  about  Hippo  to  visit  his  vine- 
yards and  olivets.  He  examined,  found  out  things, 
questioned  the  workmen,  went  into  the  presses  and 
the  mills.  He  knew  the  grape  good  to  eat,  and  the 
grape  to  make  wine  with.  He  pointed  out  where 
the  ensilage  pits  had  been  dug  in  too  marshy  land, 
which  endangered  the  young  corn.  As  a  capable 
landowner  he  was  abreast  of  the  law,  careful  about 
the  terms  of  contracts.  He  knew  the  formulas  em- 
ployed for  sales  or  benefactions.    He  saw  to  it  that 


THE   BISHOP   OF   HIPPO  279 

charcoal  was  buried  around  the  landmarks  in  the 
fields,  so  that  if  the  post  disappeared,  its  place  could 
be  found.  And  as  he  was  a  poet,  he  gathered  on 
his  course  a  whole  booty  of  rural  images  which 
later  on  went  to  brighten  his  sermons.  He  made 
ingenious  comparisons  with  the  citron-tree,  "  which 
is  seen  to  give  flowers  and  fruits  all  the  year  if  it  be 
watered  constantly,"  or  else  with  the  goat  "  who 
gets  upon  her  two  hind  legs  to  crop  the  bitter  leaves 
of  the  wild  olive." 

These  journeys  in  the  open  air,  however  tiring 
they  might  be,  were  after  all  a  rest  for  his  over- 
worked brain.  But  there  was  one  among  his  episco- 
pal duties  which  wearied  him  to  disgust.  Every  day 
he  had  to  listen  to  parties  in  dispute  and  give  judg- 
ment. Following  recent  Imperial  legislation,  the 
bishop  became  judge  in  civil  cases — a  tiresome  and 
endless  work  in  a  country  where  tricky  quibbling 
raged  with  obstinate  fury.  The  litigants  pursued 
Augustin,  overran  his  house,  like  those  fellahs  in 
dirty  burnous  who  block  our  law-courts  with  their 
rags.  In  the  secretarium  of  the  basilica,  or  under  the 
portico  of  the  court  leading  to  the  church,  Augustin 
sat  like  a  Mussulman  cadi  in  the  court  of  the  mosque. 

The  emperors  had  only  regulated  an  old  custom  of 
apostolic  times  in  placing  the  Christians  under  the 
jurisdiction  of  their  bishop.  In  accordance  with 
St.  Paul's  advice,  the  priests  did  their  utmost  to 
settle  differences  among  the  faithful.  Later,  when 
their  number  had  considerably  increased,  the  Govern- 
ment adopted  a  system  not  unlike  the  "  Capitula- 
tions "  in  countries  under  the  Ottoman  suzerainty. 
Lawsuits  between  clerics  and  laymen  could  not  be 
equitably  judged  by  civil  servants,  who  were  often 


28o  SAINT   AUGUSTIN 

pagans.  Moreover,  the  parties  based  their  claims 
on  theological  principles  or  religious  laws  that  the 
arbitrator  generally  knew  nothing  about.  In  these 
conditions,  it  was  natural  enough  that  the  Imperial 
authority  should  say  to  the  disputants,  "  Fight  it 
out  among  yourselves/' 

And  it  happened,  just  at  the  moment  when 
Augustin  began  to  fill  the  see  of  Hippo,  that  Theo- 
dosius  broadened  still  more  the  judicial  prerogatives 
of  the  bishops.  The  unhappy  judge  was  over- 
whelmed with  law-cases.  Every  day  he  sat  till 
the  hour  of  his  meal,  and  sometimes  the  whole  day 
when  he  fasted.  To  those  who  accused  him  of  lazi- 
ness, he  answered  : 

"  I  can  declare  on  my  soul  that  if  it  were  question 
of  my  own  convenience,  I  should  like  much  better 
to  work  at  some  manual  labour  at  certain  hours  of 
the  day,  as  the  rule  is  in  well-governed  monasteries, 
and  have  the  rest  of  the  time  free  to  read  or  pray 
or  meditate  upon  the  Holy  Scripture,  instead  of 
being  troubled  with  all  the  complications  and  dull 
talk  of  lawsuits." 

The  rascality  of  the  litigants  made  him  indignant. 
From  the  pulpit  he  gave  them  advice  full  of  Christian 
wisdom,  but  which  could  not  have  been  much 
relished.  A  suit  at  law,  according  to  him,  was  a 
loss  of  time  and  a  cause  of  sorrow.  It  would  be 
better  to  let  the  opponent  have  the  money,  than  to 
lose  time  and  be  filled  with  uneasiness.  Nor  was 
this,  added  the  preacher  in  all  good  faith,  to  en- 
courage injustice  ;  for  the  robber  would  be  robbed 
in  his  turn  by  a  greater  robber  than  himself. 

These  reasons  seemed  only  moderately  convincing. 
The  pettifoggers  did  not  get  discouraged.     On  the 


THE   BISHOP  OF  HIPPO  281 

contrary,  they  infested  the  bishop  with  their  pleas. 
As  soon  as  he  appeared,  they  rushed  up  to  him  in 
a  mob,  surrounded  him,  kissed  his  hand  and  his 
shoulder,  protesting  their  respect  and  obedience, 
urging  him,  constraining  him  to  busy  himself  about 
their  affairs.  Augustin  yielded.  But  the  next  day 
in  a  vehement  sermon  he  cried  out  to  them  : 

Discedite  a  me,  maligni ! — "  Go  far  from  me,  ye 
wicked  ones,  and  let  me  study  in  peace  the  com- 
mandments of  mv  God  !  " 


II 

WHAT   WAS   HEARD    IN   THE    BASILICA   OF   PEACE 

IET  US  try  to  see  Augustin  in  his  pulpit  and  in 
_^  his  episcopal  city. 

We  cannot  do  much  more  than  reconstruct  them 
by  analogy.  Royal  Hippo  is  utterly  gone.  Bona, 
which  has  taken  its  place,  is  about  a  mile  and  a  half 
away,  and  the  fragments  which  have  been  dug  out 
of  the  soil  of  the  dead  city  are  very  inadequate. 
But  Africa  is  full  of  Christian  ruins,  and  chiefly  of 
basilicas.  Rome  has  nothing  equal  to  offer.  And 
that  is  easily  understood.  The  Roman  basilicas, 
always  living,  have  been  changed  in  the  course  of 
centuries,  and  have  put  on,  time  after  time,  the 
garb  forced  upon  them  by  the  fashion.  Those  of 
Africa  have  remained  just  as  they  were — at  least 
in  their  principal  lines — on  the  morrow  of  the  Arab 
invasion,  as  Augustin's  eyes  had  seen  them.  They 
are  ruins,  no  doubt,  and  some  very  mutilated,  but 
ruins  of  which  no  restoration  has  altered  the  plan 
or  changed  the  features. 

As  the  traces  of  Hippo  and  its  church  are  swept 
away  or  deeply  buried,  we  are  obliged,  in  order  to 
get  some  approximate  idea,  to  turn  towards  another 
African  town  which  has  suffered  less  from  time  and 
devastation.  Thevestc  with  its  basilica,  the  best 
preserved,  the  finest  and  largest  in  all  Africa,  can 
restore  to  us  a  little  of  the  look  and  colour  and 

282 


HEARD  IN  THE  BASILICA  OF  PEACE      283 

atmosphere  of  Hippo  in  those  final  years  of  the 
fourth  century. 

Ancient  Theveste  was  much  larger  than  the 
present  town,  the  French  Tebessa.  This,  even  re- 
duced to  the  perimeter  of  the  Byzantine  fortress 
built  under  Justinian,  still  surprises  the  traveller 
by  its  singularly  original  aspect.  Amid  the  wide 
plains  of  alfa-grass  which  surround  it,  with  its  quad- 
rangular enclosure,  its  roads  on  the  projection  of 
the  walls  behind  the  battlements,  its  squat  turrets, 
it  has  a  look  as  archaic,  as  strange,  as  our  own 
Aigues-Mortes  amid  its  marshy  fen.  Nothing  can 
be  more  rich  and  joyous  to  the  eye  than  the  rust 
which  covers  its  ruins — a  complete  gilding  that 
one  would  say  had  been  laid  on  by  the  hand  of 
man. 

It  has  a  little  temple  which  is  a  wonder  and  has 
been  compared  to  the  ancient  Roman  temple — 
the  Maison  Carree — at  Nimes.  But  how  much 
warmer,  more  living  are  the  stones  !  The  shafts 
of  the  columns,  and  the  pilasters  of  the  perist3de, 
barked  by  time,  seem  as  scaly  and  full  of  sap  as 
the  trunks  of  palm-trees.  The  carved  acanthus- 
leaves  in  the  capitals  of  the  pillars  droop  like 
bunches  of  palms  reddened  by  the  summer. 

Quite  near,  at  the  end  of  a  narrow  street,  lined 
with  modern  and  squalid  hovels,  the  triumphal 
arch  of  Septimus  Severus  and  of  Caracalla  extends 
its  luminous  bow  ;  and  high  above  the  heavy  mass 
of  architecture,  resting  upon  slim  aerial  little 
columns,  a  buoyant  cediculus  shines  like  a  coral 
tabernacle  or  a  coffer  of  yellow  ivory. 

All  about,  forms  in  long  draperies  are  huddled. 
The  Numidian  burnous  has  the  whiteness  of  the 


284  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

toga.  It  has  also  the  same  graceful  folds.  At  the 
sight  of  them  you  suddenly  feel  yourself  to  be  in  a 
strange  land — carried  back  very  far  across  the 
centuries.  No  sooner  is  the  vision  of  antiquity  out- 
lined than  it  grows  firm.  Down  below  there,  a 
horseman,  clad  in  white,  is  framed  with  his  white 
horse  in  the  moulded  cincture  of  a  door.  He  passes, 
and  upon  the  white  wall  of  the  near  tower  his 
shadow  rests  a  moment,  like  a  bas-relief  upon  the 
marble  of  a  frieze. 
(~  Beyond  the  Byzantine  enclosure,  the  basilica, 
with  its  minor  buildings,  forms  another  town  almost 
as  large  as  the  present  Theveste,  and  also  closed  in 
by  a  belt  of  towers  and  ramparts.  One  is  im- 
mediately struck  by  the  opulent  colour  of  the  stones 
— rose,  grown  pale  and  thinner  in  the  sun  ;  and 
next,  by  the  solid  workmanship  and  the  structural 
finish.  The  stones,  as  in  the  Greek  temples,  are 
placed  on  top  of  one  another  in  regular  layers  :  the 
whole  holds  together  by  the  weight  of  the  blocks  and 
the  polish  of  the  surfaces. 
f  The  proportions  are  on  a  large  scale.  There  was 
no  grudging  for  the  buildings,  or  the  materials,  or 
the  land.  In  front  of  the  basilica  is  a  wide  rectangu- 
lar court  bordered  with  terraces  ;  a  portico  at  the 
far  end  ;  and  in  the  middle  four  large  fountains  to 
water  the  walk.  A  flagged  avenue,  closed  by  two 
gateways,  divides  this  court  from  the  basilica, 
properly  so  called,  which  is  reached  by  a  staircase 
between  two  columns.  The  staircase  leads  to  the 
atriiim  decorated  by  a  Corinthian  portico.  In  the 
centre  is  the  font  for  purifications,  a  huge  mono- 
lithic bason  in  the  shape  of  a  four-leaved  clover. 
Three  doors  give  entrance  from  the  atrium  to  the 


HEARD  IN  THE  BASILICA  OF  PEACE      285 

basilica,  which  is  divided  by  rows  of  green  marble 
columns  into  three  aisles.  The  galleries  spread  out 
along  the  side  aisles.  The  floor  was  in  mosaic.  In 
the  apse,  behind  the  altar,  stood  the  bishop's  throne. 

Around  the  main  building  clustered  a  great 
number  of  others  :  a  baptistry  ;  many  chapels  (one 
vaulted  in  the  shape  of  a  three-leaved  clover)  dedi- 
cated, probably,  to  local  martyrs  ;  a  graveyard  ; 
a  convent  with  its  cells,  and  its  windows  narrow  as 
loop-holes ;  stables,  sheds,  and  barns.  Sheltered 
within  its  walls  and  towers,  amid  its  gardens  and 
outbuildings,  the  basilica  of  Theveste  thus  early 
resembled  one  of  our  great  monasteries  of  the  Middle 
Age,  and  also  in  certain  ways  the  great  mosques  of 
Islam — the  one  at  Cordova,  or  that  at  Damascus, 
with  their  vestibules  surrounded  by  arcades,  their 
basons  for  purification,  and  their  walks  bordered 
with  orange -trees.  The  faithful  and  the  pilgrims 
were  at  home  there.  They  might  spend  the  day 
stretched  upon  the  flags  of  the  porticoes,  in  loafing 
or  sleeping  in  the  blue  shade  of  the  columns  and  the 
cool  of  the  fountains.  In  the  full  sense  of  the  word, 
the  church  was  the  House  of  God,  open  to  all. 

Very  likely  the  basilicas  at  Hippo  had  neither 
the  size  nor  the  splendour  of  this  one.  Nor  were 
there  very  many.  At  the  time  Augustin  was 
ordained  priest,  that  is  to  say,  when  the  Donatists 
had  still  a  majority  in  the  town,  it  seems  clear  that 
the  orthodox  community  owned  but  one  single 
church,  the  Basilica  major,  or  Basilica  of  Peace. 
Its  very  name  proves  this.  With  the  schismatics, 
"  Peace  "  was  the  official  name  for  Catholicism. 
**  Basilica  of  Peace  "  meant  simply  **  Catholic 
Basilica."     Was  not  this  as  much  as  to  say  that 


286  SAINT   AUGUSTIN 

the  others  belonged  to  the  dissenters  ?  Doubtless 
they  restored  later  on,  after  the  promulgations  of 
Honorius,  the  Leontian  Basilica,  founded  by  Leon- 
tius,  Bishop  of  Hippo,  and  a  martyr.  A  third  was 
built  b}^  Augustin  during  his  episcopate — the  Basilica 
of  the  Eight  Martyrs  of  the  White  Mace. 

It  was  in  the  Major,  or  Cathedral,  that  Augustin 
generally  preached.  To  preach  was  not  only  a  duty, 
but  one  of  the  privileges  of  a  bishop.  As  has  been 
said,  the  bishop  alone  had  the  right  to  preach  in 
his  church.  This  arose  from  the  fact  that  the  African 
dioceses,  although  comparatively  widespread,  had 
scarcely  more  people  than  one  of  our  large  parishes 
to-day.  The  position  of  a  bishop  was  like  that  of 
one  of  our  parish  priests.  There  were  almost  as 
many  as  there  were  villages,  and  they  were  counted 
by  hundreds. 

However  that  may  be,  preaching,  the  real  apos- 
tolic ministry,  was  an  exhausting  task.  Augustin 
preached  almost  every  day,  and  often  man}^  times 
a  day — rough  work  for  a  man  with  such  a  fragile 
chest.  Thus  it  often  happened  that,  to  save  his 
voice,  he  had  to  ask  his  audience  to  keep  still.  He 
spoke  without  study,  in  a  language  very  near  the 
language  of  the  common  people.  Stenographers 
took  down  his  sermons  as  he  improvised  them  : 
hence  those  repetitions  and  lengthinesses  which 
astonish  the  reader  who  does  not  know  the  reason 
for  them.  There  is  no  plan  evident  in  these  ad- 
dresses. Sometimes  the  speaker  has  not  enough  time 
to  develop  his  thought.  Then  he  puts  off  the  con- 
tinuation till  the  next  day.  Sometimes  he  comes 
with  a  subject  all  prepared,  and  then  treats  of 
another,    in    obedience    to    a    sudden    inspiration 


HEARD  IN  THE  BASILICA  OF  PEACE      287 

which  has  come  to  him  with  a  verse  of  Scripture  he 
has  just  read.  Other  times,  he  comments  many 
passages  in  succession,  without  the  least  care  for 
unity  or  composition. 

Let  us  hsten  to  him  in  this  Basihca  of  Peace, 
where  during  thirty-five  years  he  never  failed  to 
announce  the  Word  of  God.  .  .  .  The  chant  of  the 
Psalms  has  just  died  away.  At  the  far  end  of  the 
apse,  Augustin  rises  from  his  throne  with  its  back  to 
the  wall,  his  pale  face  distinct  against  the  golden  hue 
of  the  mosaic.  From  that  place,  as  from  the  height 
of  a  pulpit,  he  commands  the  congregation,  looking 
at  them  above  the  altar,  which  is  a  plain  wooden 
table  placed  at  the  end  of  the  great  aisle. 

The  congregation  is  standing,  the  men  on  one  side, 
the  women  on  the  other.  On  the  other  side  of  the 
balustrade  which  separates  them  from  the  crowd, 
are  the  widows  and  consecrated  virgins,  wrapped  in 
their  veils  black  or  purple.  Some  matrons,  rather 
overdressed,  lean  forward  in  the  front  rank  of  the 
galleries.  Their  cheeks  are  painted,  their  eyelashes 
and  eyebrows  blackened,  their  ears  and  necks 
overloaded  with  jewels.  Augustin  has  noticed  them  ; 
after  a  while  he  will  read  them  a  lesson.  This 
audience  is  all  alive  with  sympathy  and  curiosity 
before  he  begins.  With  all  its  faith  and  all  its 
passion  it  collaborates  with  the  orator.  It  is  turbu-. 
lent  also.  It  expresses  its  opinions  and  emotions  with 
perfect  freedom.  The  democratic  customs  of  those 
African  Churches  surprise  us  to-day.  People  made 
a  noise  as  at  the  theatre  or  the  circus.  They  ap- 
plauded ;  they  interrupted  the  preacher.  Certain 
among  them  disputed  what  was  said,  quoting 
passages  from  the  Bible. 


288  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

Augustin  is  thus  in  perpetual  communication  with 
his  audience.  Nobody  has  done  less  soaring  than 
he.  He  keeps  his  eye  on  the  facial  expressions  and 
the  attitudes  of  his  public.  He  talks  to  them 
familiarly.  When  his  sermon  is  a  little  lengthy,  he 
wants  to  know  if  his  listeners  are  getting  tired — he 
has  kept  them  standing  so  long  !  The  time  of  the 
morning  meal  draws  near.  Bellies  are  fasting, 
stomachs  wax  impatient.  Then  says  he  to  them 
with  loving  good-fellowship  : 

"  Go,  my  very  dear  brothers  and  sisters,  go  and 
restore  your  strength — I  do  not  mean  that  of  your 
minds,  for  I  see  well  that  they  are  tireless,  but  the 
strength  of  your  bodies  which  are  the  servants  of  your 
souls.  Go  then  and  restore  your  bodies  so  that  they 
may  do  their  work  well,  and  when  they  are  restored, 
come  back  here  and  take  your  spiritual  food." 

Upon  certain  days,  a  blast  of  the  sirocco  has 
passed  over  the  town.  The  faithful,  crowded  in  the 
aisles,  are  stifling,  covered  with  sweat.  The  preacher 
himself,  who  is  very  much  worked  up,  has  his  face 
dripping,  and  his  clothes  are  all  wet.  By  this  he 
perceives  that  once  more  he  has  been  extremely 
long.  He  excuses  himself  modestly.  Or  again,  he 
jokes  like  a  rough  apostle  who  is  not  repelled  by  the 
odour  of  a  lot  of  human-kind  gathered  together. 

"  Oh,  what  a  smell  !  "  says  he.  "I  must  have 
been  speaking  a  long  while  to-day." 

These  good-natured  ways  won  the  hearts  of  the 
simple  folk  who  listened  to  him.  He  is  aware  of  the 
charm  he  exerts  on  them,  and  of  the  sympathy  they 
give  him  back  in  gratitude  for  his  charity. 

"  You  have  loved  to  come  and  hear  me,  my 
brothers,"  he  said  to  them.     "  But  whom  have  you 


HEARD  IN  THE  BASILICA  OF  PEACE      289 

loved  ?  If  it  is  me — ah,  even  that  is  good,  my 
brothers,  for  I  want  to  be  loved  by  you,  if  I  do  not 
want  to  be  loved  for  myself.  As  for  me,  I  love  you 
in  Christ.  And  you  too,  do  you  love  me  in  Him. 
Let  our  love  for  one  another  moan  together  up  to 
God — and  that  is  the  moaning  of  the  Dove  spoken 
of  in  the  Scripture.  ..." 

Although  he  preaches  from  the  height  of  his 
episcopal  throne,  he  is  anxious  that  his  hearers 
should  regard  him,  Christianly,  as  their  equal.  So 
he  seems  as  little  of  the  bishop  as  possible. 

''  All  Christians  are  servants  of  the  same  master. 
...  I  have  been  in  the  place  where  you  are — you, 
my  brothers,  who  listen  to  me.  And  now,  if  I  give 
the  spiritual  bread  from  the  height  of  this  chair  to 
the  servants  of  the  Master  of  us  all — well,  it  is  but 
a  few  years  since  I  received  this  spiritual  food  with 
them  in  a  lower  place.  A  bishop,  I  speak  to  laymen, 
but  I  know  to  how  many  future  bishops  I 
speak.  ,  .  ." 

So  he  puts  himself  on  an  equal  footing  with  his 
audience  by  the  brotherly  accent  in  his  words.  It 
is  not  Christendom,  the  Universal  Church,  or  I 
know  not  what  abstract  listener  he  addresses,  but 
the  Africans,  the  people  of  Hippo,  the  parishioners 
of  the  Basilica  of  Peace.  He  knows  the  allusions,  the 
comparisons  drawn  from  local  customs,  which  are 
likely  to  impress  their  minds.  The  day  of  the  festival 
of  St.  Crispina,  a  martyr  of  those  parts,  after  he  had 
developed  his  subject  at  very  great  length,  he  asked 
pardon  in  these  terms  : 

*'  Let  us  think,  brothers,  that  I  have  invited  you 
to  celebrate  the  birthday  of  the  blessed  Crispina, 
and  that  I  have  kept  up  the  feast  a  little  too  long. 


290  SAINT   AUGUSTIN 

Well,  might  not  the  same  thing  happen  if  some 
soldier  were  to  ask  you  to  dinner  and  obliged  you 
to  drink  more  than  is  wise  ?  Let  me  do  as  much  for 
the  Word  of  God,  with  which  you  should  be  drunk 
and  surfeited/' 

Marriages,  as  well  as  birthday  feasts,  supplied 
the  orator  with  vivid  allegories.  Thus  he  says  that 
when  a  marriage  feast  is  made  in  a  house,  organs 
play  upon  the  threshold,  and  musicians  and  dancers 
begin  to  sing  and  to  act  their  songs.  And  yet  how 
poor  are  these  earthly  enjoyments  which  pass  away 
so  soon  !  ..."  In  the  House  of  God,  the  feast  has 
no  end." 

Continually,  through  the  commentaries  on  the 
I  Psalms,  like  comparisons  rise  to  the  surface — 
parables  suited  to  stir  the  imagination  of  Africans. 
A  thousand  details  borrowed  from  local  habits  and 
daily  life  enliven  the  exegesis  of  the  Bishop  of  Hippo. 
The  mules  and  horses  that  buck  when  one  is  trying 
to  cure  them,  are  his  symbol  for  the  recalcitrant 
Donatists.  The  little  donkeys,  obstinate  and  cun- 
ning, that  trot  in  the  narrow  lanes  of  Algerian 
casbahs,  appear  here  and  there  in  his  sermons.  The 
gnats  bite  in  them.  The  unendurable  flies  plaster 
themselves  in  buzzing  patches  on  the  tables  and 
walls.  Then  there  are  the  illnesses  and  drugs  of  that 
country  :  the  ophthalmias  and  coUyrium.  What 
else  ?  The  tarentulas  that  run  along  the  beams  on 
the  ceiling  ;  the  hares  that  scurry  without  warning 
between  the  horses'  feet  on  the  great  Numidian 
plains.  Elsewhere,  he  reminds  his  audience  of  those 
men  who  wear  an  earring  as  a  talisman  ;  of  the  deal- 
ings between  traders  and  sailors — a  comparison 
which  would  go  home  to  this  seafaring  people. 


HEARD  IN  THE  BASHJCA  OF  PEACE      291 

The  events  of  the  time,  the  Httle  happenings  of  the 
moment,  gUde  into  his  sermons.  At  the  same  time 
as  the  service  in  church  to-day,  there  is  going  to  be 
horse-racing  at  the  circus,  and  fights  of  wild  beasts 
or  gladiators  at  the  arena.  In  consequence,  there  will 
not  be  many  people  in  the  Basilica.  "  So  much  the 
better,"  says  Augustin.  "  My  lungs  will  get  some 
rest."  Another  time,  it  is  advertised  through  the 
town  that  most  sensational  attractions  will  be 
offered  at  the  theatre — there  will  be  a  scene  repre- 
senting the  open  sea.  The  preacher  laughs  at  those 
who  have  deserted  the  church  to  go  and  see  this 
illusion  :  "  They  will  have,"  says  he,  "  the  sea  on 
the  stage  ;  but  we,  brothers — ah,  we  shall  have  our 
port  in  Jesus  Christ."  This  Saturday,  while  he  is 
preaching,  some  Jewish  women  set  themselves  to 
dance  and  sing  on  the  terraces  of  the  near  houses, 
by  way  of  celebrating  the  Sabbath.  In  the  basilica, 
the  bashing  of  the  crotolos  can  be  heard,  and  the 
thuds  of  the  tambourines.  "  They  would  do  better," 
says  Augustin,  "  to  work  and  spin  their  wool." 

He  dwells  upon  the  catastrophes  which  were  then 
convulsing  the  Roman  world.  The  news  of  them 
spread  with  wonderful  rapidity.  Alaric's  Barbarians 
have  taken  Rome  and  put  it  to  fire  and  sword.  At 
Jerusalem  has  been  an  earthquake,  and  the  bishop 
John  organizes  a  subscription  for  the  sufferers 
throughout  Christendom.  At  Constantinople,  globes 
of  fire  have  been  seen  in  the  sky.  The  Serapeum  of 
Alexandria  has  just  been  destroyed  in  a  riot.  .  .  . 

All  these  things  follow  each  other  in  lively  pic- 
tures, without  any  apparent  order,  throughout 
Augustin's  sermons.  It  is  not  he  who  divides  his  dis- 
course into  three  parts,  and  refrains  from  passing  to 


292  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

the  second  till  he  has  learnedly  expounded  the  first. 
Whether  he  comments  upon  the  Psalms  or  the 
Gospels,  his  sermons  are  no  more  than  explanations 
of  the  Scriptures  which  he  interprets,  sometimes  in  a 
literal  sense,  and  sometimes  in  an  allegoric.  Let  us 
acknowledge  it — his  allegoric  discourses  repel  us 
by  their  extreme  subtilty,  sometimes  by  their  bad 
taste  ;  and  when  he  confines  himself  to  the  letter 
of  the  text,  he  stumbles  among  small  points  of 
grammar  which  weary  the  attention.  We  follow 
him  no  longer.  We  think  his  audience  was  very 
obliging  to  listen  so  long — and  on  their  feet — to 
these  endless  dissertations.  .  .  .  And  then,  sud- 
denly, a  great  lyrical  and  oratorical  outburst  which 
carries  us  away — a  wind  which  blows  from  the  high 
mountains,  and  in  the  wink  of  an  eye  sweeps  away 
like  dust  all  those  fine-spun  reasonings. 

He  is  fond  of  certain  commonplaces,  and  also  of 
certain  books  of  the  Bible — for  instance.  The  Song 
of  Songs  and  the  Gospel  of  St.  John,  the  one  satis- 
f^dng  in  him  the  intellectual,  and  the  other  the 
mystic  of  love.  He  confronts  the  verse  of  the 
Psalm  :  "  Before  the  morning  star  have  I  begotten 
thee,"  with  the  sublime  opening  of  the  Fourth 
Gospel :  "In  the  beginning  was  the  Word."  He 
lingers  upon  the  beauty  of  Christ  :  Speciosus  forma 
prcB  filiis  hominum,  "  Thou  art  fairer  than  the  chil- 
dren of  men."  This  is  why  he  is  always  repeating 
with  the  Psalmist  :  "  Thy  face.  Lord,  have  I 
sought  " — QucBsivi  vuUum  tuum,  Domine.  And  the 
orator,  carried  away  by  enthusiasm,  adds  :  "  Mag- 
nificent saying  !  Nothing  more  divine  could  be 
said.  Those  feel  it  who  truly  love."  Another  of  his 
favourite  subjects  is  the  kindness  of  God  :    Videte 


HEARD  IN  THE  BASILICA  OF  PEACE      293 

et  gustate  quam  mitis  sit  Dominus — "  O  taste  and 
see  that  the  Lord  is  good."  Naught  can  equal  the 
pleasure  of  this  contemplation,  of  this  life  in  God. 
Augustin  conceives  it  as  a  musician  who  has 
fathomed  the  secret  of  numbers.  "  Let  your 
life,"  he  said,  "  be  one  prolonged  song.  .  .  .  We  do 
not  sing  only  with  the  voice  and  lips  when  we  intone 
a  canticle,  but  in  us  is  an  inward  singing,  because 
there  is  also  in  us  Some  One  who  listens.  ..." 

To  live  this  rhythmic  and  divine  life  we  must  get 
free  of  ourselves,  give  ourselves  up  utterly  in  a  great 
outburst  of  charity. 

"  Why,"  he  cries — "  Oh,  why  do  you  hesitate 
to  give  yourselves  lest  you  should  lose  yourselves  ? 
It  is  rather  by  not  giving  yourselves  that  you  lose 
yourselves.  Charity  herself  speaks  to  you  by  the 
mouth  of  Wisdom  and  upholds  you  against  the  terror 
which  fills  you  at  the  sound  of  those  words  :  '  Give 
yourself.'  If  some  one  wanted  to  sell  you  a  piece 
of  land,  he  would  say  to  you  :  '  Give  me  your 
gold.'  And  for  something  else,  he  would  say  : 
'  Give  me  your  silver,  give  me  your  money.'  Listen 
to  what  Charity  says  to  you  by  the  mouth  of  Wis- 
dom :  '  My  son,  give  me  thy  heart.'  '  Give  me,' 
quoth  she.  Give  what  ?  '  My  son,  give  me  thy  heart.' 
.  .  .  Thy  heart  was  not  happy  when  it  was  governed 
by  thee,  and  was  thine,  for  it  turned  this  way  and 
that  way  after  gaw^ds,  after  impure  and  dangerous 
loves.  'Tis  from  there  thy  heart  must  be  drawn. 
Whither  lift  it  up  ?  Where  to  place  it  ?  '  Give  me 
thy  heart,'  says  Wisdom,  '  let  it  be  mine,  and  it  will 
belong  to  thee  for  always.'  " 

After  the  chant  of  love,  the  chant  of  the  Resurrec- 
tion.    Cantate  miki  canticum  novum — "  Sing  to  me 


294  SAINT   AUGUSTIN 

a  new  song  !  "  Augustin  repeats  these  words  over 
and  over  again.  "  We  wish  to  rise  from  the  dead," 
cry  souls  craving  for  eternity.  And  the  Church 
answers  :  "  Verily,  I  say  unto  3^ou,  that  you  shall 
rise  from  the  dead.  Resurrection  of  bodies,  resurrec- 
tion of  souls,  ye  shall  be  altogether  reborn."  Augus- 
tin has  explained  no  dogma  more  passionately. 
None  was  more  pleasing  to  the  faithful  of  those  times. 
Ceaselessly  they  begged  to  be  strengthened  in  the 
conviction  of  immortality  and  of  meeting  again 
brotherlike  in  God. 

With  what  intrepid  delight  it  rose — this  song  of 
the  Resurrection  in  those  clear  African  basilicas 
swimming  in  light,  with  all  their  brilliant  ornamenta- 
tion of  mosaics  and  marbles  of  a  thousand  colours  ! 
And  what  artless  and  confident  language  those 
symbolic  figures  spoke  which  peopled  their  walls — 
the  lambs  browsing  among  clusters  of  asphodels,  the 
doves,  the  green  trees  of  Paradise.  As  in  the 
Gospel  parables,  the  birds  of  the  field  and  farm- 
yard, the  fruits  of  the  earth,  figured  the  Christian 
truths  and  virtues.  Their  purified  forms  accom- 
panied man  in  his  ascension  towards  God.  Around 
the  mystic  chrisms,  circled  garlands  of  oranges  and 
pears  and  pomegranates.  Cocks,  ducks,  partridges, 
flamingoes,  sought  their  pasture  in  the  Paradisal 
fields  painted  upon  the  walls  of  churches  and 
cemeteries. 

Those  young  basilicas  were  truly  the  temples  of 
the  Resurrection,  where  all  the  creatures  of  the 
Ark  saved  from  the  waters  had  found  their  refuge. 
Never  more  in  the  centuries  to  follow  shall  humanity 
know  this  frank  joy  at  having  triumphed  over  death 
— this  youth  of  hope. 


Ill 

THE   bishop's   burthen 

AUGUSTIN  is  not  only  the  most  human  of  all 
L  the  saints,  he  is  also  one  of  the  most  amiable  in 
all  the  senses  of  that  hackneyed  word — amiable  ac- 
cording to  the  world,  amiable  according  to  Christ. 

To  be  convinced  of  this,  he  should  be  observed 
in  his  dealings  with  his  hearers,  with  his  correspon- 
dents, even  with  those  he  attacks — with  the  bitterest 
enemies  of  the  faith.  Preaching,  the  administration 
of  property,  and  sitting  in  judgment  were  but  a  part 
of  that  episcopal  burthen,  Sarcina  episcopatus, 
under  which  he  so  often  groaned.  He  had  further- 
more to  catechize,  baptize,  direct  consciences,  guard 
the  faithful  against  error,  and  dispute  with  all  those 
who  threatened  Catholicism.  Augustin  was  a  light 
of  the  Church.     He  knew  it. 

Doing  his  best,  with  admirable  conscientiousness 
and  charity  he  undertook  these  tasks.  God  knows  what 
it  must  have  cost  this  Intellectual  to  fulfil  precisely 
all  the  duties  of  his  ministry,  down  to  the  humblest. 
What  he  would  have  liked,  above  all,  was  to  pass  his 
life  in  studying  the  Scriptures  and  meditating  on  the 
dogmas — not  from  a  love  of  trifling  with  theories, 
but  because  he  believed  such  knowledge  necessary 
to  whoever  gave  forth  the  Word  of  God.  Most  of 
the  priests  of  that  age  arrived  at  the  priesthood 
without  any  previous  study.   They  had  to  improvise, 

295 


296  SAINT   AUGUSTIN 

as  quick  as  they  could,  a  complete  education  in 
religious  subjects.  We  are  left  astounded  before  the 
huge  labour  which  Augustin  must  have  given  to 
acquire  his.  Before  long  he  even  dominated  the 
whole  exegetical  and  theological  knowledge  of  his 
time.  In  his  zeal  for  divine  letters,  he  knew  sleep 
no  more. 

And  yet  he  did  not  neglect  any  of  his  tasks.  Like 
the  least  of  our  parish  priests,  he  prepared  the  neo- 
phytes for  the  Sacraments.  He  was  an  incomparable 
catechist,  so  clear-sighted  and  scrupulous  that  his 
instructions  may  still  be  taken  as  models  by  the 
catechists  of  to-day.  Neither  did  he,  as  an  aristocrat 
of  the  intelligence,  only  trouble  himself  with  persons 
of  culture,  and  leave  to  his  deacons  the  care  of  God's 
common  people.  All  had  a  right  to  his  lessons,  the 
simple  peasants  as  well  as  the  rich  and  scholarly. 
One  dav,  a  farmer  he  was  teaching  walked  off  and 
left  him  there  in  the  middle  of  his  discourse.  The 
poor  man,  who  had  fasted,  and  now  listened  to  his 
bishop  standing,  was  faint  from  hunger  and  felt  his 
legs  tremble  under  him.  He  thought  it  better  to 
run  away  than  to  fall  down  exhausted  at  the  feet 
of  the  learned  preacher. 

With  his  knowledge  of  men,  Augustin  carefully 
studied  the  kind  of  people  his  catechumens  were, 
and  adapted  his  instructions  to  the  character  of  each. 
If  they  were  city  folk,  Carthaginians,  used  to  spend- 
ing their  time  in  theatres  and  taverns,  drunken  and 
lazy,  he  took  a  different  tone  with  them  from  what 
he  used  with  rustics  who  had  never  left  their  native 
gourbi.  If  he  were  dealing  with  fashionable  people 
who  had  a  taste  for  literature,  he  did  not  fail  to 
exalt   the   beauties   of  the   Scripture,  although,  he 


THE   BISHOP'S   BURTHEN  297 

would  say,  they  had  there  a  very  trifling  attraction 
compared  to  the  truths  contained  in  it.  Of  all  the 
catechumens,  the  hardest  to  deal  with,  the  most 
fearsome  in  his  eyes,  were  the  professors — the 
rhetoricians  and  the  grammarians.  These  men  are 
bloated  with  vanity,  puffed  up  with  intellectual 
pride.  Augustin  knew  something  about  that.  It 
will  be  necessary  to  rouse  them  violently,  and  before 
anything  else,  to  exhort  them  to  humility  of  mind. 

The  good  saint  goes  further.  Not  only  is  he 
anxious  about  the  souls,  but  also  about  the  bodies 
of  his  listeners.  Are  they  comfortable  for  listening  ? 
As  soon  as  they  feel  tired  they  must  not  hesitate  to 
sit  down,  as  is  the  usage  in  the  basilicas  beyond  seas. 

*'  Would  not  our  arrogance  be  unbearable,"  he 
asked,  "  if  we  forbade  men  who  are  our  brothers  to 
sit  down  in  our  presence,  and,  much  more,  men 
whom  we  ought  to  try  with  all  possible  care  to  make 
our  brothers  ?   .  .  ." 

If  they  are  seen  to  yawn,  "  then  things  ought  to 
be  said  to  them  to  awaken  their  attention,  or  to 
scatter  the  sad  thoughts  which  may  have  come  into 
their  minds."  The  catechist  should  shew,  now  a 
serene  joy — the  joy  of  certainty  ;  now  a  gaiety 
which  charms  people  into  belief  ;  "  and  always  that 
light-heartedness  we  should  have  in  teaching." 
Even  if  we  ourselves  are  sad  from  this  reason  or 
that,  let  us  remember  that  Jesus  Christ  died  for 
those  who  are  listening  to  us.  Is  not  the  thought 
of  bringing  Him  disciples  enough  to  make  us  joyful  ? 

Bishop  Augustin  set  the  example  for  his  priests.  It 
is  not  enough  to  have  prepared  the  conversion  of 
his  catechumens  with  the  subtlety  of  the  psycholo- 
gist, and  such  perfect  Christian  charity ;    but  he 


298  SAINT   AUGUSTIN 

accompanies  them  to  the  very  end,  and  charges 
them  once  more  before  the  baptismal  piscina. 

How  he  is  changed  !  One  thinks  of  the  boon- 
fellow  of  Romanianus  and  of  Manlius  Theodorus,  of 
the  young  man  who  followed  the  hunts  at  Thagaste, 
and  who  held  forth  on  literature  and  philosophy  in 
a  select  company  before  the  beautiful  horizons  of  the 
lake  of  Como.  Here  he  is  now  with  peasants, 
slaves,  sailors,  and  traders.  And  he  takes  pleasure 
in  their  society.  It  is  his  flock.  He  ought  to  love 
it  with  all  his  soul  in  Jesus  Christ.  What  an  effort 
and  what  a  victory  upon  himself  an  attitude  so 
strange  reveals  to  us  !  For  really  this  liking  for 
mean  people  was  not  natural  to  him.  He  must  have 
put  an  heroic  will-power  into  it,  helped  by  Grace. 

A  like  sinking  of  his  preferences  is  evident  in  the 
director  of  consciences  he  became.  Here  he  was 
obliged  to  give  himself  more  thoroughly.  He  was 
at  the  mercy  of  the  souls  who  questioned  him,  who 
consulted  him  as  their  physician.  He  spends  his 
time  in  advising  them,  and  exercises  a  never-failing 
supervision  of  their  morals.  It  is  an  almost  dis- 
couraging enterprise  to  bend  these  hardened  pagans 
— above  all,  these  Africans — to  Christian  discipline. 
Augustin  is  continually  reproaching  their  drunken- 
ness, gluttony,  and  lust.  The  populace  were  not 
the  only  ones  to  get  drunk  and  over-eat  themselves. 
The  rich  at  their  feasts  literally  stuffed  till  they 
choked.  The  Bishop  of  Hippo  never  lets  a  chance 
go  by  to  recall  them  to  sobriety. 

Oftener  still,  he  recalls  them  to  chastity.  He 
writes  long  letters  on  this  subject  which  are  actual 
treatises.  The  morals  of  the  age  and  country  are 
fully  disclosed  in  them.    Husbands  are  found  loudly 


THE   BISHOP'S   BURTHEN  299 

claiming  a  right  to  free  love  for  themselves,  while 
they  force  their  wives  to  conjugal  fidelity.  The 
adultery  they  allow  themselves,  they  punish  with 
death  in  their  wives.  They  make  an  abusive  practice 
of  divorce.  Upon  the  most  futile  reasons,  they  send 
the  wife  the  libellus  repudii — the  bill  repudiating  the 
marriage — as  the  various  peoples  of  Islam  do  still. 
This  society  in  a  state  of  transition  was  always  creat- 
ing cases  of  conscience  for  strict  Christians.  For  ex- 
ample :  If  a  man  cast  off  his  wife  under  pretext  of 
adultery,  might  he  marry  again  ?  Augustin  held  that 
no  marriage  can  be  dissolved  as  long  as  both  parties 
are  living.  But  may  not  this  prohibition  provoke 
husbands  to  kill  their  adulterous  wives,  so  as  to  be 
free  to  take  a  new  wife  ?  Another  problem  :  A 
catechumen  divorced  under  the  pagan  law  and  since 
remarried,  presents  himself  for  baptism.  Is  he  not 
an  adulterer  in  the  eyes  of  the  Church  ?  A  man 
who  lives  with  a  woman  and  does  not  hide  it,  who 
even  declares  his  firm  intention  of  continuing  to  live 
with  his  concubine — can  he  be  admitted  to  baptism  ? 
Augustin  has  to  answer  all  these  questions,  and  go 
into  the  very  smallest  details  of  casuistry. 

Is  it  forbidden  to  eat  the  meats  consecrated  to 
idols,  even  when  a  man  or  woman  is  dying  of 
hunger  ?  May  one  enter  into  agreements  with  native 
camel-drivers  and  carriers  who  swear  by  their  gods 
to  keep  the  bargain  ?  May  a  lie  be  told  in  certain 
conditions  ? — say,  so  as  to  get  among  heretics  in 
pretending  to  be  one  of  themselves,  and  thus  be 
able  to  spy  on  them  and  denounce  them  ?  May 
adultery  be  practised  with  a  woman  who  promises  in 
exchange  to  point  out  heretics  ?  .  .  .  The  Bishop  of 
Hippo  severely  condemns  all  these  devious  or  shame- 


300  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

ful  ways,  all  these  compromises  which  are  contrary 
to  the  pure  moral  teaching  of  the  Gospel.  But  he 
does  this  without  affecting  intolerance  and  rigidity, 
and  with  a  reminder  that  the  evil  of  sin  lies  alto- 
gether in  the  intention,  and  in  the  consent  of  the 
will.  In  a  word,  one  must  tolerate  and  put  up  with 
what  one  is  powerless  to  hinder. 

Other  questions,  which  it  is  quite  impossible  to 
repeat  here,  give  us  a  strange  idea  of  the  corruption 
of  pagan  morals.     Augustin  had  all  he  could  do  to 
maintain  the  Christian  rule  in  such  surroundings, 
where  the  Christians  themselves  were  more  or  less 
tainted  with  paganism.    But  if  this  troop  of  sinners 
and  backsliders  was  hard  to  drive,  the  devout  were 
perhaps   harder.      There   were   the    continents — the 
widowers   and   widows   who   had   made   a   vow   of 
chastity  and  found  this  vow  heavy  ;    the  conse- 
crated virgins  who  lived  in  too  worldly  a  fashion  ; 
the  nuns  who  rebelled  against  their  spiritual  director 
V  or  their  superior  ;    the  monks,  either  former  slaves 
j/who  did  not  want  to  do  another  stroke  of  work,  or 
charlatans   who   played    upon    public   credulity   in 
selling  talismans  and  miraculous  ointments.     Then, 
the  married  women  who  refused  themselves  to  their 
,  husbands  ;    and  those  who  gave  away  their  goods 
j  to  the  poor  without  their  husbands'  consent  ;    and 
j  also  the  proud  virgins  and  widows  who  despised  and 
condemned  marriage. 

Then  came  the  crowd  of  pious  souls  who  ques- 
tioned Augustin  on  points  of  dogma,  who  wanted 
to  know  all,  to  clear  up  everything  ;  those  who 
thought  they  should  be  able  here  below  to  see  God 
face  to  face,  to  know  how  we  shall  arise,  and  who 
asked  if  the  angels  had  bodies.  .  .  .  Augustin  com- 


THE   BISHOP'S   BURTHEN  301 

plains  that  they  are  annoying,  when  he  has  so  many 
other  things  to  trouble  him,  and  that  they  take  him 
from  his  studies.  But  he  tries  charitably  to  satisfy 
them  all. 

Besides  all  this,  he  was  obliged  to  keep  up  a 
correspondence  with  a  great  number  of  people.  In 
addition  to  his  friends  and  fellow-bishops,  he  wrote 
to  unknown  people  and  foreigners  ;  to  men  in  high 
place  and  to  lowly  people  ;  to  the  proconsuls,  the 
counts  and  the  vicars  of  Africa  ;  to  the  very  mighty 
Olympius,  Master  of  the  Household  to  the  Emperor 
Honorius  ;  or  again,  "  to  the  Right  Honourable 
Lady  Maxima,"  "  to  the  Illustrious  Ladies  Proba 
and  Juliana,"  "  to  the  Very  Holy  Lady  Albina  " — 
women  who  belonged  either  to  the  provincial 
nobility,  or  to  the  highest  aristocracy  of  Rome.  To 
whom  did  he  not  write  ?   .  .  . 

And  what  is  admirable  in  these  letters  is  that  he 
does  not  answer  negligently  to  get  rid  of  a  tiresome 
duty.  Almost  all  of  them  are  full  of  substantial 
teaching,  long  thought  over.  Many  were  intended 
to  be  published — they  are  practically  charges.  And 
yet,  however  grave  the  tone  of  them  may  be,  the 
cultivated  man  of  the  world  he  had  been  may  be 
traced.  His  correspondents,  after  the  fashion  of  the 
time,  overwhelm  the  bishop  with  the  most  fulsome 
praises.  These  he  accepts,  with  much  ceremony 
indeed,  but  he  does  accept  them  as  evidence  of  the 
charity  of  his  brethren.  Ingenuously,  he  does  his 
best  to  return  them.  Let  us  not  grow  over-scan- 
dalized because  our  men  of  letters  of  to-day  have 
debased  the  value  of  complimentary  language  by 
squandering  and  exaggerating  it.  The  most  austere 
cotemporaries  of  Augustin,  and  Augustin  himself, 


302  SAINT   AUGUSTIN 

outdid  them  by  a  long  way  in  the  art  and  in  the 
abuse  of  comphments. 

PauHnus  of  Nola,  always  beflowered  and  elegant, 
wrote  to  Augustin  :  "Your  letters  are  a  luminous 
collyrium  spread  over  the  eyes  of  my  mind."  Augus- 
tin, who  remonstrated  with  him  upon  the  scarcity  of 
his  own  letters,  replies  in  language  which  our  own 
Precieuses  would  not  have  disowned:  "  What  !  You 
allow  me  to  pass  two  summers — and  two  African  sum- 
mers ! — in  such  thirst  ?  .  .  .  Would  to  God  that  you 
would  allow  enter  to  the  opulent  banquet  of  your 
book,  the  long  fast  from  your  writings  which  you 
have  put  me  upon  during  all  a  year  !  If  this  banquet 
be  not  ready,  I  shall  not  give  over  my  complaints, 
unless,  indeed,  that  in  the  time  between,  you  send 
me  something  to  keep  up  my  strength."  A  certain 
Audax,  who  begged  the  honour  of  a  special  letter 
from  the  great  man,  calls  him  "  the  oracle  of  the 
Law  "  ;  protests  that  the  whole  world  celebrates 
and  admires  him  ;  and  finally,  at  the  end  of  his 
arguments,  conjures  him  in  verse  to  "  Let  fall  upon 
me  the  dew  of  thy  divine  word."  Augustin,  with 
modesty  and  benignity,  returns  his  compliments, 
but  not  without  slipping  into  his  reply  a  touch  of 
banter  :  "  Allow  me  to  point  out  to  you  that  your 
fifth  line  has  seven  feet.  Has  your  ear  betrayed  you, 
or  did  you  want  to  find  out  if  I  was  still  capable 
of  judging  these  things  ?  "  .  .  .  Truly,  he  is  always 
capable  of  judging  these  things,  nor  is  he  sorry  to 
have  it  known.  A  young  Greek  named  Dioscorus, 
who  is  passing  through  Carthage,  questions  him 
upon  the  philosophy  of  Cicero.  Augustin  exclaims 
at  any  one  daring  to  interrupt  a  bishop  about  such 
trifles.     Then,  little  by  little,  he  grows  milder,  and 


THE   BISHOP'S   BURTHEN  303 

carried  away  by  his  old  passion,  he  ends  by  sending 
the  young  man  quite  a  dissertation  on  this  good 
subject. 

Those  are  among  his  innocent  whimsicaUties. 
Then,  alongside  of  letters  either  too  literary,  or 
erudite,  or  profound,  there  are  others  which  are 
simply  exquisite,  such  as  the  one  he  wrote  to  a 
young  Carthage  girl  called  Sapida.  She  had  em- 
broidered a  tunic  for  her  brother.  He  was  dead, 
and  she  asked  Augustin  kindly  to  wear  this  tunic, 
telling  him  that  if  he  would  do  this,  it  would  be  a 
great  comfort  for  her  in  her  grief.  The  bishop  con- 
sented very  willingly.  "  I  accept  this  garment," 
he  said  to  her,  "  and  I  have  begun  to  wear  it  before 
writing  to  you.  ..."  Then  gently  he  pities  her 
sorrow,  and  persuades  her  to  resignation  and  hope. 

"  We  should  not  rebuke  people  for  weeping  over 
the  dead  who  are  dear  to  them.  .  .  .  When  we  think 
of  them,  and  through  habit  we  look  for  them  still 
around  us,  then  the  heart  breaks,  and  the  tears  fall 
like  the  blood  of  our  broken  heart.  ..." 

At  the  end,  in  magnificent  words,  he  chants  the 
hymn  of  the  Resurrection  : 

"  My  daughter,  your  brother  lives  in  his  soul,  if 
in  his  body  he  sleeps.  Does  not  the  sleeper  wake  ? 
God,  who  has  received  his  soul,  will  put  it  again  in 
the  body  He  has  taken  from  him,  not  to  destroy  it — 
oh,  no,  but  some  day  to  give  it  to  him  back." 

This  correspondence,  voluminous  as  it  is,  is  nothing 
beside  his  numberless  treatises  in  dogma  and 
polemic.  These  were  the  work  of  his  life,  and  it  is 
by  these  posterity  has  known  him.  The  theolo- 
gian and  the  disputer  ended  by  hiding  the  man  in 


304  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

Augustin.  To-day,  the  man  perhaps  interests  us 
more.  And  this  is  a  mistake.  He  himself  would  not 
have  allowed  for  a  moment  that  his  Confessions 
should  be  preferred  to  his  treatises  on  Grace.  To 
study,  to  comment  the  Scriptures,  to  draw  more 
exact  definitions  from  the  dogmas — ^he  saw  no 
higher  employment  for  his  mind,  or  obligation  more 
important  for  a  bishop.  To  believe  so  as  to  under- 
stand, to  understand  the  better  to  believe — it  is  a 
ceaseless  movement  of  the  intelligence  which  goes 
from  faith  to  God  and  from  God  to  faith.  He 
throws  himself  into  this  great  labour  without  a 
shade  of  any  attempt  to  make  literature,  with  a 
complete  sinking  of  his  tastes  and  his  personal 
opinions,  and  in  it  he  entirely  forgets  himself. 

One  single  time  he  has  thought  of  himself,  and  it 
is  precisely  in  the  Confessions,  the  spirit  of  which 
modern  people  understand  so  ill,  and  where  they 
try  to  find  something  quite  different  from  what  the 
author  intended.  He  composed  them  just  after  he 
was  raised  to  the  bishopric,  to  defend  himself 
against  the  calumnies  spread  about  his  conduct.  It 
seems  as  if  he  wanted  to  say  to  his  detractors  : 
"  You  believe  me  guilty.  Well,  I  am  so,  and  more 
perhaps  than  you  think,  but  not  in  the  way  you 
think."  A  great  religious  idea  alters  this  personal 
defence.  It  is  less  a  confession,  or  an  excuse  for  his 
faults,  in  the  present  sense  of  the  word,  than  a  con- 
tinual glorification  of  the  divine  mercy.  It  is  less 
the  shame  of  his  sins  he  confesses,  than  the  glorv  of 
God. 

After  that,  he  never  thought  again  of  anything  but 
Truth  and  the  Church,  and  the  enemies  of  Truth 
and  the  Church  :    the  Manichees,  the  Arians,  the 


THE   BISHOP'S   BURTHEN  305 

Pelagians — the  Donatists,  above  all.  He  lets  no 
error  go  by  without  refuting  it,  no  libel  without  an 
answer.  He  is  always  on  the  breach.  He  might  well 
be  compared,  in  much  of  his  writings,  to  one  of  our 
fighting  journahsts.  He  put  into  this  generally 
thankless  business  a  wonderful  vigour  and  dia- 
lectical subtlety.  Always  and  everywhere  he  had 
to  have  the  last  word.  He  brought  eloquence 
to  it,  yet  more  charity — sometimes  even  wit. 
And  lastly,  he  had  a  patience  which  nothing  could 
dishearten.  He  repeats  the  same  things  a  hundred 
times  over.  These  tiresome  repetitions,  into  which 
he  was  driven  by  the  obstinacy  of  his  opponents, 
caused  him  real  pain.  Every  time  it  became  neces- 
sary, he  took  up  again  the  endless  demonstration 
without  letting  himself  grow  tired.  The  moment 
it  became  a  question  of  the  Truth,  Augustin  could 
not  see  that  he  had  any  right  to  keep  quiet. 

In  Africa  and  elsewhere  they  made  fun  of  what 
they  called  his  craze  for  scribbling.  He  himself,  in 
his  Retractations,  is  startled  by  the  number  of  his 
works.  He  turns  over  the  Scripture  saying  which 
the  Donatists  amusingly  opposed  to  him  :  Vcb 
multum  loquentihus — "  Woe  unto  them  of  many 
words."  But  calling  God  to  witness,  he  says  to 
Him:  Vcb  tacentibus  de  te — "Woe  unto  those  who 
keep  silent  upon  Thee."  In  the  eyes  of  Augustin, 
the  conditions  were  such  that  silence  would  have 
been  cowardly.  And  elsewhere  he  adds  :  "  They 
may  believe  me  or  not  as  they  will,  but  I  like  much 
better  to  read  than  to  write  books.  ..." 

In  any  case,  his  modesty  was  evident.  "  I  am 
myself,"  he  acknowledges,  "  almost  always  dis- 
satisfied  with   what   I   sav."     To   the   heretics   he 


3o6  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

declares,  with  a  glance  back  at  his  own  errors,  "  I 
know  by  experience  how  easy  it  is  to  be  wrong." 
When  there  is  some  doubt  in  questions  of  dogma, 
he  does  not  force  his  explanations,  but  suggests 
them  to  his  readers.  How  much  intellectual  humility 
is  in  that  prayer  which  ends  his  great  work  on  the 
Trinity  :  "  Lord  my  God,  one  Trinity,  if  in  these 
books  I  have  said  anything  which  comes  from  Thee, 
may  Thou  and  Th}^  chosen  receive  it.  But  if  it  is 
from  me  it  comes,  may  Thou  and  Thine  forgive  me." 

And  again,  how  much  tolerance  and  charity  in 
those  counsels  to  the  faithful  of  his  diocese  who, 
having  been  formerly  persecuted  by  the  Donatists, 
now  burned  to  get  their  revenge  : 

"It  is  the  voice  of  your  bishop,  my  brothers, 
sounding  in  your  ears.  He  implores  you,  all  of  you 
who  are  in  this  church,  to  keep  yourselves  from 
insulting  those  who  are  outside,  but  rather  to  pray 
that  they  may  enter  with  you  into  communion." 

Elsewhere,  he  reminds  his  priests  that  they  must 
preach  at  the  Jews  in  a  spirit  of  friendliness  and 
loving-kindness,  without  troubling  to  know  if  they 
listen  with  gratitude  or  indignation.  "  We  ought 
not,"  said  he,  "  to  bear  ourselves  proudly  against 
these  broken  branches  of  Christ's  tree."  .  .  . 

This  charity  and  moderation  took  nothing  from 
the  firmness  of  his  character.  This  he  proved  in  a 
startling  way  in  the  discussion  he  had  with  St. 
Jerome  over  a  passage  in  the  Epistle  to  the  Galatians, 
and  upon  the  new  translation  of  the  Bible  which 
Jerome  had  undertaken.  The  solitary  of  Bethlehem 
saw  a  "  feint  "  on  the  part  of  St.  Paul  in  the 
disputed  passage  :  Augustin  said,  a  "lie."  What, 
then,  would  become  of  evangelic  truth  if  in  such 


THE   BISHOP'S   BURTHEN  307 

a  place  the  Apostle  had  lied  ?  And  would  not  this 
be  a  means  of  authorizing  all  the  exegetical  fantasies 
of  heresiarchs,  who  already  rejected  as  altered  or 
forged  all  verses  of  the  holy  books  which  conflicted 
with  their  own  doctrines  ?  .  .  . 

As  to  the  new  translation  of  the  Bible,  it  would 
bring  about  trouble  in  the  African  churches,  where 
they  were  accustomed  to  the  ancient  version  of  the 
Septuagint.  The  mistranslations,  pointed  out  by 
Jerome  in  the  old  version,  would  upset  the  faithful 
and  lead  them  to  suspect  that  the  entire  Scripture 
was  false.  In  this  double  matter,  Augustin  defended 
at  once  orthodoxy  and  tradition  from  very  praise- 
worthy reasons  of  prudence. 

Jerome  retorted  in  a  most  aggressive  and  offensive 
tone.  He  flatly  accused  the  Bishop  of  Hippo  of 
being  jealous  of  him  and  of  wishing  to  cut  out  a 
reputation  for  learning  at  his  expense.  In  front  of 
his  younger  and  more  supple  adversary,  he  took  on 
the  air  of  an  old  wrestler  who  was  still  capable  of 
knocking  out  any  one  who  had  the  audacity  to  attack 
him.  He  hurled  at  Augustin  this  phrase  heavy  with 
menaces  :  "  The  tired  ox  stands  firmer  than  ever 
on  his  four  legs." 

For  all  that,  Augustin  stuck  to  his  opinion,  and 
he  confined  himself  to  replying  gently  :  "In  any- 
thing I  say,  I  am  not  only  always  ready  to  receive 
your  observations  upon  what  you  find  wounding 
and  contrary  to  your  feelings,  but  I  even  ask  your 
advice  as  earnestlv  as  I  can."  .  .  . 


IV 

AGAINST   "  THE   ROARING    LIONS  " 

ONE  day  (this  was  soon  after  he  became  bishop) 
Augustin  went  to  visit  a  Cathohc  farmer  in  the 
suburbs  of  Hippo,  whose  daughter  had  been  lessoned 
by  the  Donatists,  and  had  just  enrohed  herself  among 
their  consecrated  virgins.  The  father  at  first  had 
shouted  at  the  deserter,  and  flogged  her  unmercifully 
by  way  of  improving  her  state  of  mind.  Augustin, 
when  he  heard  of  the  affair,  condemned  the  farmer's 
brutality  and  declared  that  he  would  never  receive 
the  girl  back  into  the  community  unless  she  came 
of  her  own  free  will.  He  then  went  out  to  the  place 
to  try  and  settle  the  matter.  On  the  way,  as  he  was 
crossing  an  estate  which  belonged  to  a  Catholic 
matron,  he  fell  in  with  a  priest  of  the  Donatist 
Church  at  Hippo.  The  priest  at  once  began  to 
insult  him  and  his  companions,  and  yelled  : 

"  Down  with  the  traitors  !  Down  with  the 
persecutors  !  " 

And  he  vomited  out  abominations  against  the 
matron  herself  who  owned  the  land.  As  much 
from  prudence  as  from  Christian  charity,  Augustin 
did  not  answer.  He  even  prevented  those  with  him 
from  falling  upon  the  insulter. 

Incidents  of  this  kind  happened  almost  every  day. 
About  the  same  time,  the  Donatists  of  Hippo  made 
a  great  noise  over  the  rebaptizing  of  another  apos- 

^08 


AGAINST   "THE   ROARING  LIONS"   309 

tate  from  the  Catholic  community.  This  was  a 
good-for-nothing  loafer  who  beat  his  old  mother, 
and  the  bishop  severely  rebuked  his  monstrous 
conduct. 

"  Well,  as  you  talk  in  that  tone  of  voice,"  said  the 
loafer,  "  I'm  going  to  be  a  Donatist." 

Through  bravado,  he  continued  to  ill-treat  the 
poor  old  woman,  and  to  make  the  worst  kind  of 
threats.     He  roared  in  savage  fury  : 

"  Yes,  I'll  become  a  Donatist,  and  I'll  have  your 
blood." 

And  the  young  ruffian  did  really  go  over  to  the 
Donatist  party.  In  accordance  with  the  custom 
among  the  heretics,  he  was  solemnly  rebaptized  in 
their  basilica,  and  he  exhibited  himself  on  the  plat- 
form clad  in  the  white  robe  of  the  purified.  People 
in  Hippo  were  much  shocked.  Augustin,  full  of  in- 
dignation, addressed  his  protests  to  Proculeianus,  the 
Donatist  bishop.  ' '  What !  is  this  man,  all  bloody  with 
a  murder  in  his  conscience,  to  walk  about  for  eight  days 
in  white  robes  as  a  model  of  innocence  and  purity  ?  " 
But  Proculeianus  did  not  condescend  to  reply. 

These  cynical  proceedings  were  trifling  compared 
to  the  vexations  which  the  Donatists  daily  inflicted 
on  their  opponents.  Not  only  did  they  tamper  with 
Augustin's  people,  but  the  country  dwellers  of  the 
Catholic  Church  were  continually  interfered  with 
on  their  lands,  pillaged,  ravaged,  and  burned  out  by 
mobs  of  fanatical  brigands  who  organized  a  rule 
of  terror  from  one  end  of  Numidia  to  the  other. 
Supported  in  secret  by  the  Donatists,  they  called 
themselves  "  the  Athletes  of  Christ."  The  Catholics 
had  given  them  the  contemptuous  name  of  "  Cir- 
concelliones,"   or  prowlers  around  cellars,   because 


310  SAINT   AUGUSTIN 

they  generally  plundered  cellars  and  grain-houses. 
Troops  of  fanaticized  and  hysterical  women  rambled 
round  with  them,  scouring  the  country  hke  your 
true  bacchantes,  clawing  the  unfortunate  wretches 
who  fell  into  their  hands,  burning  farms  and  harvests, 
broaching  barrels  of  wine  and  oil,  and  crowning 
these  exploits  by  orgies  with  "  the  Athletes  of 
Christ."  When  they  saw  a  haystack  blazing  in  the 
fields,  the  country-folk  were  panic-stricken — the 
"  Circoncelliones "  were  not  far  off.  Soon  they 
appeared,  brandishing  their  clubs  and  bellowing 
their  war  cry  :  Deo  laudes  ! — "  Praise  be  to  God." 
"  Your  shout,"  said  Augustin  to  them,  "  is  more 
dreaded  by  our  people  than  the  roaring  of  lions." 

Something  had  to  be  done  to  quell  these  furious 
monsters,  and  to  resist  the  encroachments  and  forcible 
acts  of  the  heretics.  These,  by  way  of  frightening 
the  CathoUc  bishops,  told  them  roundly  : 

*'  We  don't  want  any  of  your  disputes,  and  we 
are  going  to  rebaptize  just  as  it  suits  us.  We  are 
going  to  lay  snares  for  your  sheep  and  to  rend  them 
like  wolves.  As  for  you,  if  you  are  good  shepherds, 
keep  quiet  !  " 

Augustin  was  not  a  man  to  keep  quiet,  nor  yet 
to  spend  his  strength  in  small  local  quarrels.  He 
saw  big  ;  he  did  not  imprison  himself  within  the 
limits  of  his  diocese.  He  knew  that  Numidia  and  a 
good  part  of  Africa  were  in  the  hands  of  the  Donatists  ; 
that  they  had  a  rival  primate  to  the  Catholic  primate 
at  Carthage  ;  that  they  had  even  sent  a  Pope  of 
their  community  to  Rome.  In  a  word,  they  were 
in  the  majority.  Everywhere  a  dissenting  Church 
rose  above  the  orthodox  Church,  when  it  did  not 
succeed  in  stifling  it  altogether.     At  all  costs  the 


AGAINST  "THE   ROARING  LIONS"   ^ai 


o- 


progress  of  this  sect  must  be  stopped.  In  Augustin's 
eyes  there  was  no  more  urgent  work.  For  him  and 
his  flock  it  was  a  question  of  insuring  their  Hves, 
since  they  were  attacked  even  in  their  fields  and 
houses.  From  the  moment  he  first  came  to  Hippo, 
as  a  simple  priest,  he  had  thrown  himself  intrepidly 
into  this  struggle.  He  never  ceased  till  Donatism 
was  conquered  and  trampled  underfoot.  To  estab- 
lish peace  and  Catholic  unity  everywhere  was  the 
great  labour  of  his  episcopate. 

Who,  then,  were  these  terrible  Donatists  whom 
we  have  been  continually  striking  against  since  the 
beginning  of  this  history  ? 

It  would  soon  be  a  century  since  they  had  been 
disturbing  and  desolating  Africa.  Just  after  the 
great  persecution  of  Diocletian,  the  sect  was  born, 
and  it  increased  with  amazing  rapidity.  During 
this  persecution,  evidence  had  not  been  wanting  of 
the  moral  slackness  in  the  African  Church.  A  large 
number  of  lay  people  apostatized,  and  a  good  num- 
ber of  bishops  and  priests  handed  over  to  the  pagan 
authorities,  besides  the  devotional  objects,  the 
Scriptures  and  the  muniments  of  their  communities. 
In  Numidia,  and  especially  at  Constantine,  scanda- 
lous scenes  took  place.  The  cowardice  of  the  clergy 
was  lamentable.  Public  opinion  branded  with  the 
names  of  traditors,  or  traitors,  those  who  had 
weakened  and  given  over  the  sacred  books  to  the 
pagans. 

The  danger  once  over,  the  Numidians,  w^hose 
behaviour  had  been  so  little  brilliant,  determined 
to  redeem  themselves  by  audacity,  and  to  prove  with 
superb  impudence  that  they  had  been  braver  than 
the  others.    So  they  set  themselves  to  shout  traditor 


312  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

against  whoever  displeased  them,  and  particularly 
against  those  of  Carthage  and  the  Proconsulate.  At 
bottom  it  was  the  old  rivalry  between  the  two 
Africas,  East  and  West. 

Under  the  reign  of  Constantine  a  peace  had  been 
patched  up,  when  it  fell  out  that  a  new  Bishop  of 
Carthage  had  to  be  elected,  and  the  Archdeacon 
Caecilianus,  whose  name  was  put  forward,  was 
accused  of  preventing  the  faithful  from  visiting  the 
martyrs  in  their  prisons.  The  zealots  contended 
that  in  collusion  with  his  bishop,  Mensurius,  he 
had  given  up  the  Holy  Scriptures  to  the  Roman 
authorities  to  be  burned.  The  election  promised  to 
be  stormy.  The  supporters  of  the  Archdeacon,  who 
feared  the  hostility  of  the  Numidian  bishops,  did 
not  wait  for  their  arrival.  They  hurried  things  over. 
Caecilianus  was  elected  and  consecrated  by  three 
bishops  of  the  district,  of  whom  one  was  a  certain 
Felix  of  Abthugni. 

At  once  the  opposite  clan,  backed  up  by  the 
Numidians,  objected.  At  their  head  was  a  wealthy 
Spanish  woman  named  Lucilla,  an  unbalanced 
devotee,  who,  it  seemed,  always  carried  about  her 
person  a  bone  of  a  martyr,  and  a  doubtful  one  at  that. 
She  would  ostentatiously  kiss  her  relic  before  receiv- 
ing the  Eucharist.  The  Archdeacon  Caecilianus  for- 
bade this  devotion  as  superstitious,  and  thus  made 
a  relentless  enemy  of  the  fanatical  Spaniard.  All 
the  former  accusations  were  renewed  against  him, 
and  it  was  added  that  Felix  of  Abthugni,  who  had 
consecrated  him,  was  a  traditor.  Hence  the  election 
was  void,  by  the  single  fact  of  the  unworthiness  of 
the  consecrating  bishops.  Lucilla,  having  bribed 
a   section    of    the    bishops    assembled    in    council, 


AGAINST   "THE   ROARING   LIONS"    313 

Caecilianus  was  deposed,  and  the  deacon  Majorinus 
elected  in  his  room.  He  himself  was  soon  after 
succeeded  by  Donatus,  an  active,  clever,  and  ener- 
getic man,  who  organized  resistance  so  ably,  and 
who  represented  so  well  the  spirit  of  the  sect,  that 
he  left  it  his  name.  Henceforth,  Donatism  enters 
into  history. 

But  Caecilianus  had  on  his  side  the  bishops  over- 
seas and  the  Imperial  Government.  The  Pope  of 
Rome  and  the  Emperor  recognized  him  as  legiti- 
mately elected.  Besides  that,  he  cleared  himself 
of  all  the  grievances  urged  against  him.  Finally, 
an  inquiry,  conducted  by  laymen,  proved  that  Felix 
of  Abthugni  was  not  a  traditor.  The  Donatists 
appealed  to  Constantine,  then  to  two  Councils  con- 
voked successively  at  Rome  and  Aries.  Every- 
where they  were  condemned.  Moreover,  the  Council 
of  Aries  declared  that  the  character  of  him  who 
confers  the  Sacraments  has  no  influence  whatever 
on  their  validity.  Thus,  baptism  and  ordination, 
even  conferred  by  a  traditor,  were  canonically  sound. 

This  decision  was  regarded  as  an  abominable 
heresy  by  the  Donatists.  As  a  matter  of  fact,  there 
was  an  old  African  tradition,  accepted  by  St.  Cyprian 
himself,  that  an  unworthy  priest  could  not  adminis- 
ter the  Sacraments.  The  local  prejudice  would  not 
yield  :  all  were  rebaptized  who  had  been  baptized 
by  the  Catholics — that  is  to  say,  by  the  supporters 
of  the  traditor s. 

The  theological  question  was  complicated  with 
a  question  of  property  which  was  all  but  insoluble. 
Since  the  Donatist  bishops  were  resolved  to  separate 
from  the  Catholic  communion,  did  they  mean  to 
give  up,   with  their  title,   their  basilicas   and  the 


314  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

^  property  belonging  to  their  churches  ?  Supposing 
that  they  themselves  were  disinterested,  they  had 
behind  them  the  crowd  of  clients  and  land-tillers 
who  got  their  living  out  of  the  Church,  and  dwelt 
on  Church  property.  Never  would  these  people 
allow  a  rival  party  to  alter  the  direction  of  the 
charities,  to  plant  themselves  in  their  fields  and 
their  gourhis,  to  expel  them  from  their  cemeteries 
and  basilicas.  Other  reasons,  still  deeper  perhaps, 
induced  the  Donatists  to  persevere  in  the  schism. 
These  religious  dissensions  were  agreeable  to  that 
'  old  spirit  of  division  which  at  all  times  has  been 
the  evil  genius  of  Africa.  The  Africans  have  always 
felt  the  need  of  segregating  themselves  from  one 
another  in  hostile  cofs.  They  hate  each  other  from 
[  one  village  to  another — for  nothing,  just  for  the 
I  pleasure  of  hating  and  felling  each  other  to  the 
ground. 

At  bottom,  here  is  what  Donatism  really  was  :  It 
was  an  extra  sharp  attack  of  African  individualism. 
These  rebels  brought  in  nothing  new  in  dogma. 
They  would  not  even  have  been  heretics  without 
their  claim  to  rebaptize.  They  limited  themselves 
to  retain  a  position  gained  long  ago  ;  to  keep  their 
churches  and  properties,  or  to  seize  those  of  the 
Catholics  upon  the  pretence  that  they  were  them- 
selves the  legitimate  owners.  With  that,  they 
affected  a  respect  for  tradition,  an  austerity  in 
morals  and  discipline,  which  made  them  perfect 
puritans.  Yes,  they  were  the  pure,  the  irreconcil- 
ables,  who  alone  had  not  bent  before  the  Roman 
officials.  All  this  was  very  pleasing  to  the  discon- 
tented and  quarrelsome,  and  caressed  the  popular 
instinct  in  its  tendency  to  particularism. 


AGAINST   "THE   ROARING   LIONS"   315 

That  is  why  the  sect  became,  httle  by  Httle, 
mistress  of  almost  the  whole  country.  Then  it 
subdivided,  crumbled  up  into  little  churches  which 
excommunicated  each  other.  In  Southern  Numidia, 
the  citadels  of  orthodox  Donatism,  so  to  speak,  were 
Thimgad  and  Bagai.  Carthage,  with  its  primate, 
was  the  official  centre.  But  in  the  Byzacena  and 
Tripolitana  Regio,  there  were  the  Maximianists,  and 
the  Rogatists  in  Mauretania,  who  had  cut  them- 
selves off  from  the  Great  Church.  These  divisions 
of  the  schism  corresponded  closely  enough  to  the 
natural  compartments  of  North  Africa.  There 
must  be  some  incompatibility  of  temper  between 
these  various  regions.  To  this  day,  Algiers  prides 
itself  on  not  thinking  like  Constantine,  which  does 
not  think  like  Bona  or  like  Tunis. 

Are  we  to  see  in  Donatism  a  nationalist  or  separa- 
tist movement  directed  against  the  Roman  occupa- 
tion ?  That  would  be  to  transport  quite  modern 
ideas  into  antiquity.  No  more  in  Augustin's  time 
than  in  our  own  was  there  such  a  thing  as  African 
nationality.  But  if  the  sectaries  had  no  least 
thought  of  separating  from  Rome,  it  is  none  the  less 
true  that  they  were  in  rebellion  against  her  repre- 
sentatives, temporal  as  well  as  spiritual.  Supposing 
that  Rome  had  yielded  to  them — an  impossible 
event,  of  course — that  would  have  meant  a  sur- 
render to  the  claims  of  Africans  who  wished  to  be 
masters  of  their  property  as  well  as  of  their  religious 
beliefs  in  their  own  country.  What  more  could  they 
have  wanted  ?  It  little  mattered  to  them  who  was 
the  nominal  master,  provided  that  they  had  the 
realities  of  government  in  their  hands.  Altogether, 
Donatism  is  a  regionalist  revindication,  very  strongly 


3i6  SAINT   AUGUSTIN 

characterized.  It  is  a  remarkable  fact  that  it  was 
among  the  indigenous  population,  ignorant  of  Latin, 
that  the  most  of  its  adherents  were  recruited. 

Such  was  the  position  of  the  Church  in  Africa 
when  Augustin  was  named  Bishop  of  Hippo.  He 
judged  it  at  once,  with  his  clear-sightedness,  his 
strong  good  sense,  his  broad  outlook  of  a  Roman 
citizen  freed  from  the  smallnesses  of  a  local  spirit, 
his  Christian  idealism  which  took  no  heed  of  the 
accidents  or  considerations  of  worldly  prosperity- 
What  !  was  Catholicism  to  become  an  African  re- 
ligion, a  restricted  sect,  wretchedly  tied  to  the 
letter  of  tradition,  to  the  exterior  practices  of 
worship  ?  To  reign  in  a  little  corner  of  the  world 
— did  Christ  die  for  that  ?  Never  !  Christ  died  for 
the  wide  world.  The  only  limits  of  His  Church  are 
the  limits  of  the  universe.  And  besides,  in  this 
resolution  to  exclude,  what  becomes  of  the  great 
principle  of  Charity  ?  It  is  by  charity,  above  all, 
that  we  are  Christians.  Faith  without  love  is  a 
faith  stagnant  and  dead.  .  .  . 

Augustin  also  foresaw  the  consequences  of  spiritual 
separation  ;  he  had  them  already  under  his  eyes. 
The  Church  is  the  great  spring,  not  only  of  love,  but 
of  intelligence.  Once  cut  away  from  this  reviving 
spring,  Donatism  would  become  dry  and  stunted 
like  a  branch  stripped  from  a  tree.  The  deep  sense 
of  its  dogmas  would  become  impoverished  as  its 
works  emptied  themselves  of  the  spirit  of  charity. 
Obstinacy,  narrowness,  lack  of  understanding, 
fanaticism,  and  cruelty — there  you  had  the  inevit- 
able fruits  of  schism.  Augustin  knew  the  rudeness 
and  ignorance  of  his  opponents,  even  of  the  most 


AGAINST   "THE   ROARING   LIONS"   317 

cultivated  among  them  :  he  might  well  ask  himself 
in  anguish  what  would  become  of  the  African 
Church  deprived  of  the  benefit  of  Roman  culture, 
isolated  from  the  great  intellectual  current  which 
united  all  the  churches  beyond  seas.  Finally,  he 
knew  his  fellow-countrymen  ;  he  knew  that  the 
Donatists,  even  victorious,  even  sole  masters  of  the 
land,  would  turn  against  themselves  the  fury  they 
now  satisfied  against  the  Catholics,  and  never  stop 
tearing  each  other  in  pieces.  Here  was  now  nearly 
a  hundred  years  that  they  had  kept  Africa  in  fire 
and  blood.  This  meant  before  very  long  a  return  to 
barbarism.  Separated  from  Catholicism,  they  would 
really  separate  from  the  Empire  and  even  from 
civilization.  And  so  it  was  that  in  fighting  for 
Catholic  unity,  Augustin  fought  for  the  Empire  and 
for  civilization. 

Confronted  with  these  barbarians  and  sectaries, 
his  attitude  could  not  be  doubtful  for  a  single 
moment.  He  must  do  his  best  to  bring  them  back 
to  the  Church.  It  was  only  a  matter  of  hitting  upon 
the  most  effectual  means. 

Preaching,  for  an  orator  such  as  he  was,  should 
be  an  excellent  weapon.  His  eloquence,  his  dialectic, 
his  profane  and  sacred  learning,  gave  him  an  im- 
mense superiority  over  the  defenders  of  the  oppo- 
site side.  He  certainly  kept  in  the  Church  many 
Catholics  who  were  ready  to  apostatize.  But  before 
the  crowd  of  schismatics,  all  these  high  gifts  were 
as  good  as  lost.  The  people  were  in  no  wise  anxious 
to  know  upon  which  side  truth  was  to  be  found. 
They  were  Donatists,  as  they  were  Numidians 
or  Carthaginians,  without  knowing  why — because 
everybody   about    them   was.      Many   might   have 


3i8  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

answered  like  that  grammarian  of  Constantine, 
who  told  the  inquisitors  with  astute  simplicity : 

"  I  am  a  professor  of  Roman  literature,  a  teacher  of 
Latin  grammar.  M3/  father  was  a  decurion  at  Constan- 
tine ;  my  grandfather  was  a  soldier  and  had  served 
in  the  guard.  Our  family  is  of  Moorish  blood.  .  .  . 
As  for  me,  I  am  quite  ignorant  about  the  origin  of 
the  schism  :  I  am  just  one  of  the  ordinary  faithful 
of  the  people  called  Christians.  When  I  was  at 
Carthage,  Bishop  Secundus  came  there  one  day.  I 
heard  tell  that  they  found  out  that  Bishop  Cae- 
cilianus  had  been  ordained  irregularly  by  I  don't 
know  who,  and  they  elected  another  bishop  against 
him.  That's  how  the  schism  began  at  Carthage. 
I  have  no  means  of  knowing  much  about  the  origin 
of  the  schism,  because  there  has  never  been  more 
than  one  church  in  our  city.  If  there  has  been  a 
schism  here,  we  know  nothing  about  it." 

When  a  grammarian  talked  thus,  what  could 
have  been  the  thoughts  of  agricultural  labourers, 
city  workmen,  and  slaves  ?  They  belonged  to  an 
estate,  or  a  quarter  of  a  town,  where  no  other  faith 
than  theirs  had  ever  been  professed.  They  were 
Donatists  like  their  employers,  like  their  neighbours, 
like  the  other  people  of  the  cof  to  which  they  had 
belonged  from  father  to  son.  The  theological  side 
of  the  question  left  them  absolutely  indifferent.  If 
Augustin  tried  to  debate  with  them,  they  refused  to 
listen  and  referred  him  to  their  bishops.  That  was 
the  word  of  command. 

The  bishops,  on  their  side,  avoided  all  discus- 
sion. Augustin  tried  in  vain  to  arrange  an  argument 
with  Proculeianus,  his  Donatist  colleague  at  Hippo. 
And    if    some    of    them    shewed    themselves    more 


AGAINST   "THE   ROARING   LIONS"   319 

obliging,  the  evasions  and  reticences  of  the  antago- 
nist, and  sometimes  outside  circumstances,  made  the 
debate  utterly  futile.  At  Thubursicum  the  audience 
raised  such  a  noise  in  the  place  where  Augustin  was 
debating  with  the  bishop  Fortunius,  that  they  were 
no  longer  able  to  hear  each  other.  At  other  times, 
the  meeting  sank  to  an  oratorical  joust,  wherein  they 
tired  themselves  out  passading  against  words,  in- 
stead of  attacking  the  matters  at  issue.  Augustin 
felt  that  he  was  losing  his  time.  Besides,  the 
Donatist  bishops  presented  an  obstinate  front  against 
which  everything  smashed. 

"  Leave  us  in  our  errors,"  they  said  ironically. 
"  If  we  are  lost  in  your  eyes,  why  follow  us  about  ? 
We  don't  want  to  be  saved." 

And  they  prohibited  their  flocks  from  saluting 
Catholics,  from  speaking  to  them,  from  going  into 
their  churches  or  into  their  houses,  from  sitting- 
down  in  the  midst  of  them.  They  laid  an  interdict 
on  their  adversaries.  Primanius,  the  Donatist 
Primate  of  Carthage,  upon  being  invited  to  a  con- 
ference, answered  proudly  : 

"  The  sons  of  the  martyrs  can  have  nothing  to 
do  with  the  race  of  traitors." 

This  being  the  state  of  the  case,  no  method  of 
pacification  was  left  but  written  controvers}^.  Augus- 
tin shewed  himself  tireless  at  it.  It  was  chiefly  in 
these  letters  and  treatises  against  the  Donatists  that 
he  was  not  afraid  to  repeat  himself.  He  knew  that 
he  was  dealing  with  the  deaf,  and  with  the  deaf  who 
did  not  want  to  hear  :  he  was  obliged  to  raise  his 
voice.  With  admirable  self-denial  he  reiterated 
the  same  arguments  a  hundred  times  over,  a  hun- 
dred times  took  up  the  history  of  the  quarrel  from 


320  SAINT   AUGUSTIN 

the  beginning,  spreading  such  a  hght  over  the 
quibbles  and  refinings  of  his  contradictors,  that  it 
should  have  brought  conviction  to  the  bluntest 
minds.  "  No,"  he  repeated,  "  Caecilianus  was  not 
a  traditor,  nor  Felix  of  Abthugni  either  who  conse- 
crated him  bishop.  The  documents  are  there  to 
prove  this.  And  even  supposing  they  were,  can  the 
fault  of  a  single  man  be  charged  to  the  whole  Church  ? 
.  .  .  Then  why  do  you  baptize  the  Catholics  under 
the  pretence  that  their  priests  are  traditors  and  as 
such  unworthy  to  administer  the  Sacraments  ?  It 
is  the  sacrifice  of  Jesus  Christ  and  not  the  virtue  of 
the  priest  which  renders  baptism  efficacious.  If  it 
were  otherwise,  what  was  the  good  of  the  Redemp- 
tion ?  It  is  the  fact  that  by  the  voluntary  death 
of  Christ,  all  men  have  been  called  to  salvation. 
Salvation  is  not  the  privilege  of  Africans  only. 
Being  Catholic,  the  Church  should  take  in  the  whole 
world.  ..." 

In  the  long  run,  these  continual  repetitions  end 
by  seeming  wearisome  to  modern  readers  :  for 
us  there  arises  out  of  all  these  discussions  a  dense 
and  intolerable  boredom.  But  let  us  remember 
that  all  this  was  singularly  living  for  Augustin's 
cotemporaries,  that  these  thankless  developments 
were  read  with  passion.  And  then,  too,  it  was  a 
question  of  the  unity  of  the  Church  which  involved, 
as  we  cannot  too  often  repeat,  the  interest  of  the 
Empire  and  civilization. 

Against  so  persuasive  a  power  the  Donatists  op- 
posed a  conspiracy  of  silence.  Their  bishops  for- 
bade the  people  to  read  what  Augustin  wrote. 
They  did  more — they  concealed  their  own  libels  so 
that    it   was   impossible   to   reply   to   them.      But 


AGAINST   ''THE   ROARING  LIONS"   321 

Augustin  used  all  his  skill  to  unearth  them.  He 
refuted  them,  and  had  his  refutations  recopied  and 
posted  on  the  walls  of  the  basilicas.  The  copies 
circulated  through  the  province  and  the  whole 
Roman  world. 

This  would  have  had  an  excellent  result  if  the 
quarrel  had  been  entirely  over  questions  of  theory. 
But  immense  property  interests  came  into  it,  and 
rancours  and  terrible  hates.  Augustin  was  forced 
to  pass  from  verbal  polemics  to  direct  action — 
defensive  action,  at  first,  and  then  attack. 

While  he  and  his  fellow-bishops  did  their  utmost 
to  preach  peace,  the  Donatist  bishops  urged  their 
followers  to  the  holy  war.  Augustin  even  received 
threats  on  his  life.  During  one  of  his  visitations,  he 
was  nearly  assassinated.  Men  in  ambush  lay  in 
wait  for  him.  By  a  providential  chance,  he  took 
the  wrong  road,  and  owed  his  life  to  this  mistake. 
His  pupil  Possidius,  who  was  then  Bishop  of  Guelma, 
was  not  so  lucky.  Brought  to  bay  in  a  house  by  the 
Donatist  bishop  Crispinus,  he  defended  himself 
desperately.  They  set  fire  to  the  house  to  turn  him 
out.  When  there  was  nothing  else  left  but  to  be 
burned  alive,  he  did  come  out.  The  band  of  Dona- 
tists  seized  him,  and  would  have  beaten  his  brains 
out,  if  Crispinus  himself,  fearing  a  prosecution  for 
murder,  had  not  interfered.  But  the  assailants 
sacked  the  property  and  slaughtered  all  the  horses 
and  mules  in  the  stables.  At  Bagai,  Bishop  Maxi- 
mianus  was  stabbed  in  his  basilica.  A  furious  mob 
smashed  the  altar  and  began  to  strike  the  victim 
with  the  fragments,  and  left  him  for  dead  on  the 
flags.  The  Catholics  lifted  up  his  body,  but  the 
Donatists  plucked  him  out  of  their  hands  and  flung 


322  SAINT   AUGUSTIN 

him  from  the  top  of  a  tower,  and  he  fell  on  a  dung- 
hill which  broke  the  fall.  The  unhappy  man  still 
breathed,  and  by  a  miracle  he  recovered. 

Meanwhile,  the  Circoncelliones,  armed  with  their 
bludgeons,  continued  to  pillage  and  burn  the  farms. 
They  tortured  the  owners  to  extract  their  money 
from  them.  They  made  them  toil  round  the  mill- 
path  like  beasts  of  burthen,  while  they  lashed  at 
them  with  whips.  At  their  back,  the  Donatist 
priests  invaded  the  Catholic  churches  and  lands. 
There  and  then  thej^  rebaptized  the  labourers.  These 
doings  were,  indeed,  very  like  the  practices  of  the 
African  Mussulmans  to-day,  who,  in  like  circum- 
stances, always  begin  b}^  converting  the  Christian 
farm-hands  by  main  force.  Then  they  purified  the 
basilicas  by  scraping  down  the  walls  and  washing 
the  floors  with  big  douches  of  water  ;  and  after 
demolishing  the  altar,  they  scattered  salt  where  it 
had  stood.  It  was  a  perfect  disinfection.  The 
Donatists  treated  the  Catholics  like  the  plague- 
stricken. 

Such  acts  cried  out  for  vengeance.  Augustin, 
who  up  till  this  time  had  recoiled  from  asking  the 
public  authorities  to  prosecute,  who,  as  an  observer 
of  the  apostolic  tradition,  did  not  recognize  the 
interference  of  the  civil  power  in  Church  matters — 
well,  Augustin  had  to  give  way  to  circumstances, 
and  also  to  the  pressure  brought  to  bear  on  him  by 
his  colleagues.  Councils  assembled  at  Carthage 
petitioned  the  Emperor  to  take  exceptional  measures 
against  the  Donatists,  who  laughed  at  all  the  laws 
directed  against  heretics.  When  they  were  sum- 
moned before  the  courts  they  demonstrated  to  the 
judges,    who    were    often    pagans    incompetent    to 


AGAINST   "THE   ROARING   LIONS"   323 

decide  in  these  questions,  that  it  was  they  who 
really  belonged  to  the  only  orthodox  Church. 
Something  must  be  done  to  end  this  equivocal  posi- 
tion, and  to  bring  about  once  for  all  a  categorical 
condemnation  of  the  schism.  Augustin,  acting  in 
concert  with  the  primate  Aurelius,  was  the  ruling 
spirit  of  these  meetings. 

Let  us  not  judge  his  conduct  by  modern  ideas,  or 
be  in  a  hurry  to  exclaim  against  his  intolerance. 
He  and  the  Catholic  bishops,  in  acting  thus,  were 
complying  with  the  old  tradition  which  had  in- 
fluenced all  the  pagan  governments.  Rome,  par- 
ticularly, though  it  recognized  all  the  local  sects, 
all  the  foreign  religions,  never  allowed  any  of  its 
subjects  to  refuse  to  fall  in  with  the  official  religion. 
The  persecutions  of  the  Christians  and  the  Jews 
had  no  other  motive.  Now  that  it  was  become  the 
State  religion,  Christianity,  willingly  or  unwillingly, 
had  to  summon  people  to  the  same  obedience. 
The  Emperors  made  a  special  point  of  this  from 
political  reasons  easy  to  understand — to  prevent 
riots  and  maintain  public  order.  Even  if  the 
bishops  had  refrained  from  all  complaint,  the 
Imperial  Government  would  have  acted  without 
them  and  suppressed  the  disturbances  caused  by 
the  heretics. 

Just  look  at  the  situation  and  the  men  as  they 
were  at  that  moment  in  Africa.  It  was  the  Catholics 
who  were  persecuted,  and  that  with  revolting  fury 
and  cruelty.  They  were  obliged  to  defend  them- 
selves. In  the  next  place,  the  distribution  of  pro- 
perty in  those  countries  made  conversions  in  batches 
singularly  easy.  Multitudes  of  farm  tenants,  work- 
men, and  agricultural  slaves,  lived  upon  the  immense 


324  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

estates  of  one  owner.  Without  any  interest  in  dog- 
matic questions,  they  were  Donatists  simply  because 
their  master  was.  To  change  these  devouring  wolves 
into  tranquil  sheep,  it  was  often  quite  enough  if  the 
master  got  converted.  The  great  blessing  of  peace 
depended  upon  pressure  being  brought  to  bear  on 
certain  persons.  When  all  day  and  every  day  there 
was  a  risk  of  being  murdered  or  burned  out  by  irre- 
sponsible ruffians,  the  temptation  was  very  strong 
to  fall  back  on  such  a  prompt  and  simple  remedy. 
Augustin  and  his  colleagues  ended  by  making  up 
their  minds  to  do  so.  For  that  matter,  they  had  no 
choice.  They  were  bound  to  strike,  or  be  them- 
selves suppressed  by  their  enemies. 

However,  before  resorting  to  rigorous  measures, 
they  resolved  to  send  forth  a  supreme  appeal  for  re- 
conciliation. The  Catholics  proposed  a  meeting  to  the 
Donatists  in  which  they  would  loyally  examine  one 
another's  grievances.  As  personal  or  material  ques- 
tions made  the  great  bar  to  an  understanding,  they 
promised  that  every  Donatist  bishop  who  turned 
convert  should  keep  his  see.  In  places  where  a 
schismatic  and  an  orthodox  bishop  were  found  to- 
gether, they  would  come  to  a  friendly  agreement 
to  govern  the  diocese  by  turns.  Where  it  was  im- 
possible for  this  to  be  done,  it  was  proposed  that 
the  Catholic  should  resign  in  favour  of  the  other. 
Augustin  lent  all  his  eloquence  to  carry  this  motion, 
which  was  sufficiently  heroic  for  a  good  number  of 
bishops  who  were  not  so  detached  as  he  from  the 
goods  of  this  world.  And  one  must  allow  that  it 
was  difficult  to  go  much  further  in  the  way  of  self- 
denial. 

After  a  good  deal  of  skirmishing  and  hesitation  on 


AGAINST   "THE   ROARING  LIONS"   325 

the  side  of  the  schismatics,  the  Conference  met  at 
Carthage  in  June  of  the  year  411,  under  the  presi- 
dency of  an  Imperial  commissioner,  the  tribune 
MarceUinus.  Once  again,  the  Donatists  saw  them- 
selves condemned.  Upon  the  report  of  the  com- 
missioner, a  decree  of  Honorius  classed  them  defi- 
nitely among  heretics.  They  were  forbidden  to 
rebaptize  or  to  assemble  together,  under  penalties 
of  fine  and  confiscation.  Refractory  countrymen 
and  slaves  would  be  liable  to  corporal  punishment, 
and  as  for  the  clerics,  they  would  be  banished. 

The  effect  of  these  new  laws  was  not  long  in 
appearing,  and  it  fully  answered  the  wishes  of  the 
orthodox  bishops.  Many  populations  returned,  or 
pretended  to  return,  to  the  Catholic  communion. 
This  result  was  largely  the  work  of  Augustin,  who  for 
twenty  years  had  worked  to  bring  it  about  by  preach- 
ing and  controversy.  But,  as  might  be  expected,  he 
did  not  overdo  his  triumph.  Without  delay,  he  set 
himself  to  preach  moderation  to  the  conquerors. 
Nor  had  he  waited  till  the  enemy  was  defeated  to 
do  that.  Ten  years  before,  while  the  Donatists 
were  besetting  the  Catholics  everywhere,  he  said 
to  the  priests  of  his  communion  : 

"  Remember  this,  my  brothers,  so  as  to  practise 
and  preach  it  with  never- varying  gentleness.  Love 
the  men  ;  kill  the  lie  !  Lean  on  truth  without 
pride  ;  fight  for  it  without  cruelty.  Pray  for  those 
whom  you  chide,  and  for  those  to  whom  you  shew 
their  error." 

However,  the  victory  of  the  party  of  peace  was 
not  so  thorough  as  it  had  seemed  at  first,  A  good 
many  fanatics  here  and  there  grew  obstinate  in  their 
resistance.     The  Circoncelliones,  maddened,  distin- 


326  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

guished  themselves  by  a  new  outbreak  of  ravages 
and  cruelties.  They  tortured  and  mutilated  all  the 
Catholics  who  fell  into  their  hands.  They  had  in- 
vented an  unheard-of  refinement  of  torture,  which 
was  to  cover  with  lime  diluted  with  vinegar  the 
eyes  of  their  victims.  The  priest  Restitutus  was 
assassinated  in  the  suburbs  of  Hippo.  A  bishop 
had  his  tongue  and  his  hand  cut  off.  If  the  towns 
were  pretty  quiet,  terror  began  to  reign  once  more 
in  the  country  places. 

The  Roman  authorities  exerted  themselves  to 
put  an  end  to  these  bloody  scenes.  They  heavily 
chastised  the  offenders  whenever  they  could  catch 
them.  In  his  charity,  Augustin  interceded  for  them 
with  the  judges.  He  wrote  to  the  tribune  Mar- 
cellinus  : 

"  We  would  not  that  the  servants  of  God  should 
be  revenged  by  hurts  like  to  those  they  suffered. 
Surely,  we  are  not  against  depriving  the  guilty  of 
the  means  to  do  harm,  but  we  consider  it  will  be 
enough,  without  taking  their  lives  or  wrenching  any 
limb  from  them,  to  turn  them  from  their  senseless 
tumult  by  the  restraining  power  of  the  laws,  in 
bringing  them  back  to  calm  and  reason  ;  or,  in  a 
last  resort,  to  take  away  the  opportunity  for  criminal 
actions  by  employing  them  in  some  useful  work.  .  .  . 
Christian  judge,  in  this  matter  fulfil  the  duty  of  a 
father,  and  while  repressing  injustice,  do  not  forget 
humanity." 

This  compassion  of  Augustin  was  shewn  particularly 
in  his  meeting  with  Emeritus,  the  Donatist  Bishop 
of  Cherchell  (or  as  it  was  then  called,  Mauretanian 
Csesarea),  one  of  the  most  stubborn  among  the  ir- 
reconcilables.      His    attitude   in    deahng  with  this 


AGAINST   "THE   ROARING   LIONS"   327 

uncompromising  enemy  was  not  only  humane,  but 
courteous,  full  of  graciousness,  and  of  the  most  sensi- 
tive charity. 

This  fell  out  in  the  autumn  of  the  year  418,  seven 
years  after  the  great  Conference  at  Carthage.  Au- 
gustin  was  sixty-four  years  old.  How  was  it 
that  he  who  had  always  had  such  feeble  health 
undertook  at  this  age  the  long  journey  from  Hippo 
to  Caesarea  ?  We  know  that  the  Pope,  Zozimus, 
had  entrusted  him  with  a  mission  to  the  Church  of 
that  town.  With  his  tireless  zeal,  always  ready  to 
march  for  the  glory  of  Christ,  the  old  bishop  doubt- 
less saw  in  this  journey  a  fresh  opportunity  for  an 
apostle.  So  he  started  off,  in  spite  of  the  roads, 
which  were  very  unsafe  in  those  troublous  times,  in 
spite  of  the  crushing  heat  of  the  season — the  end  of 
September.  He  travelled  six  hundred  miles  across 
the  endless  Numidian  plain  and  the  mountainous 
regions  of  the  Atlas,  preaching  in  the  churches, 
halting  in  the  towns  and  the  hamlets  to  decide 
questions  of  private  interest,  ever  pursued  by  a 
thousand  business  worries  and  by  the  squabbles  of 
litigants  and  the  discontented.  At  last,  after  many 
weeks  of  fatigue  and  tribulation,  he  reached  Cher- 
chell,  where  he  was  the  guest  of  Deuterius,  the 
metropolitan  Bishop  of  Mauretania. 

Now  Emeritus,  the  deposed  bishop,  lived  mys- 
teriously in  the  suburbs,  in  constant  fear  of  some 
forcible  action  on  the  part  of  the  authorities.  When 
he  learned  the  friendly  intentions  of  Augustin,  he 
came  out  of  his  hiding-place  and  shewed  himself  in 
the  town.  In  one  of  the  squares  of  Csesarea  the  two 
prelates  met.  Augustin,  who  had  formerly  seen 
Emeritus  at  Carthage,  recognized  him,  hurried  over 


328  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

to  him,  saluted  him,  and  at  once  suggested  a  friendly 
talk. 

"  Let  us  go  into  the  church,"  he  said.  "  This 
square  is  hardly  suitable  for  a  talk  between  two 
bishops." 

Emeritus,  flattered,  agreed.  The  conversation 
continued  in  such  a  cordial  tone  that  Augustin  was 
already  rejoicing  upon  having  won  back  the  schis- 
matic. Deuterius,  following  the  line  of  conduct 
which  the  Catholic  bishops  had  adopted,  spoke  of 
resigning  and  handing  over  the  see  to  the  other.  It 
was  agreed  that  within  two  days  Emeritus  should 
come  to  the  cathedral  for  a  public  discussion  with 
his  colleague  of  Hippo.  At  the  appointed  hour 
he  appeared.  A  great  crowd  of  people  gathered 
to  hear  the  two  orators.  The  basilica  was  full.  Then 
Augustin,  turning  to  the  impenitent  Donatist,  said 
to  him  mildly  : 

"  Emeritus,  my  brother,  you  are  here.  You  were 
also  at  our  Conference  at  Carthage.  If  5^ou  were 
beaten  there,  wh}^  do  you  come  here  now  ?  If,  on 
the  other  hand,  you  think  that  you  were  not  beaten, 
tell  us  what  leads  you  to  believe  that  you  had  the 
advantage.   ..." 

What  change  had  Emeritus  undergone  in  two 
days  ?  Whatever  it  was,  he  disappointed  the  hopes 
of  Augustin  and  the  people  of  Csesarea.  He  returned 
only  ambiguous  phrases  to  the  most  pressing  and 
brotherly  urging.  Finally,  he  took  refuge  in  an 
angry  silence  from  which  it  was  found  impossible 
to  draw  him. 

Augustin  went  home  without  having  converted 
the  heretic.  No  doubt  he  was  sorely  disappointed. 
Nevertheless,  he  shewed  no  resentment  ;    he  even 


AGAINST   "THE   ROARING   LIONS"     329 

took  measures  to  ensure  the  safety  of  the  recalci- 
trant, in  a  charitable  fear  less  the  roused  people 
might  do  him  a  bad  turn.  With  all  that,  when  he 
looked  back  at  the  results  of  nearly  thirty  years  of 
struggle  against  schism,  he  might  well  say  to  him- 
self that  he  had  done  good  work  for  the  Church. 
Donatism,  in  fact,  was  conquered,  and  conquered 
by  him.  Was  he  at  last  to  have  a  chance  to  rest 
himself,  with  the  only  rest  suitable  to  a  soul  like 
his,  in  a  steady  meditation  and  study  of  the  Scrip- 
tures ?  Henceforth,  would  he  be  allowed  to  live 
a  little  less  as  a  bishop  and  a  little  more  as  a  monk  ? 
This  was  always  the  strong  desire  of  his  heart.  .  .  . 
But  new  and  worse  trials  awaited  him  at  Hippo. 


THE  SIXTH  PART 
FACE  TO  FACE  WITH  THE  BARBARIANS 


Et  nunc  veniant  omnes  quicumque  amant  Paradisum,  locum 
quietis,  locum  securitatis,  locum  perpetuae  felicitatis,  locum  in 
quo  non  pertimescas  Barbarum. 

"And  now  let  all  those  come  who  love  Paradise,  the  place  of 
quiet,  the  place  of  safety,  the  place  of  eternal  happiness,  the 
place  where  the  Barbarian  need  be  feared  no  more." 

Sermon  upon  the  Barbarian  Persecution,  vii,  g. 


THE    SACK    OF   ROME 

DURING  June  of  the  year  403,  an  astonishing 
event  convulsed  the  former  capital  of  the 
Empire.  The  youthful  Honorius,  attended  by  the 
regent  Stilicho,  came  there  to  celebrate  his  triumph 
over  Alaric  and  the  Gothic  army,  defeated  at 
PoUentia. 

The  pageantry  of  a  triumph  was  indeed  a  very 
astonishing  sight  for  the  Romans  of  that  period. 
They  had  got  so  unused  to  them  !  And  no  less 
wonderful  was  the  presence  of  the  Emperor  at  the 
Palatine.  Since  Constantine's  reign,  the  Imperial 
palaces  had  been  deserted.  They  had  hardly  been 
visited  four  times  in  a  century  by  their  master. 

Rome  had  never  got  reconciled  to  the  desertion  of 
her  princes.  When  the  Court  was  moved  to  Milan, 
and  then  to  Ravenna,  she  felt  she  had  been  un- 
crowned. Time  after  time  the  Senate  appealed  to 
Honorius  to  shew  himself,  at  least,  to  his  Roman 
subjects,  since  political  reasons  were  against  his 
dwelling  among  them.  This  journey  was  always 
put  off.  The  truth  is,  the  Christian  Caesars  did  not 
like  Rome,  and  mistrusted  her  still  half-pagan 
Senate  and  people.  It  needed  this  unhoped-for 
victory  to  bring  Honorius  and  his  councillors  to 
make  up  their  minds.  The  feeling  of  a  common  dan- 
ger had  for  the  moment  drawn  the  two  opposing 

333 


334  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

religions  together,  and  here  they  were  apparently 
making  friends  in  the  same  patriotic  delight.  Old 
hates  were  forgotten.  In  fact,  the  pagan  aris- 
tocracy had  hopes  of  better  treatment  from  Stilicho. 
On  account  of  all  these  reasons,  the  triumphant 
Caesar  was  received  at  Rome  with  delirious  joy. 

The  Court,  upon  leaving  Ravenna,  had  crossed 
the  Apennines.  A  halt  was  called  on  the  banks  of 
the  Clitumnus,  where  in  ancient  times  the  great 
white  herds  were  found  which  were  sacrificed  at  the 
Capitol  during  a  triumph.  But  the  gods  of  the 
land  had  fallen  :  there  would  be  no  opiman  bull 
this  time  on  their  altars.  The  pagans  felt  bitter 
about  it. 

Thence,  by  Narnia  and  the  Tiber  valley,  they 
made  their  way  down  into  the  plain.  The  measured 
step  of  the  legions  rang  upon  the  large  flags  of  the 
Flaminian  way.  They  crossed  the  Mulvius  bridge 
— and  old  Rome  rose  like  a  new  city.  In  anticipa- 
tion of  a  siege,  the  regent  had  repaired  the  Aurelian 
wall.  The  red  bricks  of  the  enclosure  and  the  fresh 
mason-work  of  the  towers  gleamed  in  the  sun. 
Finally,  striking  into  the  Via  lata,  the  procession 
marched  to  the  Palatine. 

The  crowd  was  packed  in  this  long,  narrow  street, 
and  overflowed  into  the  nearest  alleys.  Women, 
elaborately  dressed,  thronged  the  balconies,  and  even 
the  terraces  of  the  palace.  All  at  once  the  people 
remarked  that  the  Senate  was  not  walking  before 
the  Imperial  chariot.  Stilicho,  who  wished  to  con- 
ciliate their  good  graces,  had,  contrary  to  custom, 
dispensed  them  from  marching  on  foot  before  the 
conqueror.  People  talked  with  approval  of  this 
wily  measure  in  which  they  saw  a  promise  of  new 


THE   SACK   OF   ROME  335 

liberties.  But  applause  and  enthusiastic  cheers 
greeted  the  young  Honorius  as  he  passed  by,  sharing 
with  Stilicho  the  honour  of  the  triumphal  car. 

The  unequalled  splendour  of  his  trahea,  of  which 
the  embroideries  disappeared  under  the  number  and 
flash  of  colour  of  the  jewels,  left  the  populace  gaping. 
The  diadem,  a  masterpiece  of  goldsmith's  work, 
pressed  heavily  on  his  temples.  Emerald  pendants 
twinkled  on  each  side  of  his  neck,  which,  as  it  was 
rather  fat,  with  almost  feminine  curves,  suggested 
at  once  to  the  onlookers  a  comparison  with  Bacchus. 
They  found  he  had  an  agreeable  face,  and  even  a 
soldierly  air  with  his  square  shoulders  and  stocky 
neck.  Matrons  gazed  with  tender  eyes  on  this 
Caesar  of  nineteen,  who  had,  at  that  time,  a  certain 
beauty,  and  the  brilliance,  so  to  speak,  of  youth. 
This  degenerate  Spaniard,  who  was  really  9,  crowned 
eunuch,  and  was  to  spend  his  life  in  the  society  of 
the  palace  eunuchs  and  die  of  dropsy — this  son  of 
Theodosius  was  just  then  fond  of  violent  exercise, 
of  hunting  and  horses.  But  he  was  even  now 
becoming  ponderous  with  unhealthy  fat.  His  build 
and  bloated  flesh  gave  those  who  saw  him  at  a 
distance  a  false  notion  of  his  strength.  The  Romans 
were  most  favourably  impressed  by  him,  especially 
the  young  men. 

But  the  army,  the  safeguard  of  the  country,  was 
perhaps  even  more  admired  than  the  Emperor. 
The  legions,  following  the  ruler,  had  almost  deserted 
the  capital.  The  flower  of  the  troops  were  almost 
unknown  there.  In  consequence,  the  march  past  of 
the  cavalry  was  quite  a  new  sight  for  the  people. 
A  great  murmur  of  admiration  sounded  as  the 
cataphracti  appeared,  gleaming  in  the  coats  of  mail 


336  SAINT   AUGUSTIN 

which  covered  them  from  head  to  foot.  Upon  their 
horses,  caparisoned  in  defensive  armour,  they  looked 
hke  equestrian  statues — hke  silver  horsemen  on 
bronze  horses.  Childish  cries  greeted  each  dra- 
conarius  as  he  marched  by  carrying  his  ensign — a 
dragon  embroidered  on  a  long  piece  of  cloth  which 
flapped  in  the  wind.  And  the  crowd  pointed  at  the 
crests  of  the  helmets  plumed  with  peacock  feathers, 
and  the  scarfs  of  scarlet  silk  flowing  over  the  camber 
of  the  gilded  cuirasses.  .  .  . 

The  military  show  poured  into  the  Forum,  swept 
up  the  Via  Sacra,  and  when  it  had  passed  under  the 
triumphal  arches  of  the  old  emperors,  halted  at  the 
Palace  of  Septimus  Severus.  In  the  Stadium,  the 
crowd  awaited  Honorius.  When  he  appeared  on 
the  balcony  of  the  Imperial  box,  wild  cheering 
burst  out  on  all  the  rows  of  seats.  The  Emperor, 
diadem  on  head,  bowed  to  the  people.  Upon  that 
the  cheers  became  a  tempest.  Rome  did  not  know 
how  to  express  her  happiness  at  having  at  last  got 
her  master  back. 

On  the  eve  of  the  worst  catastrophes  she  had  this 
supreme  day  of  glory,  of  desperate  pride,  of  uncon- 
querable faith  in  her  destiny.  The  public  frenzy 
encouraged  them  in  the  maddest  hopes.  The  poet 
Claudian,  who  had  followed  the  Court,  became  the 
mouthpiece  of  these  perilous  illusions.  "  Arise  !  " 
he  cried  to  Rome,  "  I  prithee  arise,  O  venerable 
queen  !  Trust  in  the  goodwill  of  the  gods.  O  city, 
fling  away  the  mean  fears  of  age,  thou  who  art  im- 
mortal as  the  heavens!  ..." 

For  all  that,  the  Barbarian  danger  continued  to 
threaten.  The  victory  of  PoUentia,  which,  more- 
over,   was    not    a    complete    victory,    had    settled 


THE   SACK   OF   ROME  337 

nothing.  Alaric  was  in  flight  in  the  Alps,  but  he 
kept  his  eye  open  for  a  favourable  chance  to  fall 
back  upon  Italy  and  wrench  concessions  of  money 
and  honours  from  the  Court  of  Ravenna.  Sup- 
ported by  his  army  of  mercenaries  and  adventurers 
in  the  pay  of  the  Empire  like  himself,  his  dealings 
with  Honorius  were  a  kind  of  continual  blackmail. 
If  the  Imperial  Government  refused  to  pay  the  sums 
which  he  protested  it  owed  him  for  the  maintenance 
of  his  troops,  he  would  pay  himself  by  force.  Rome, 
where  fabulous  riches  had  accumulated  for  so  many 
centuries,  was  an  obvious  prey  for  him  and  his 
men.  He  had  coveted  it  for  a  long  time  ;  and  to 
get  up  his  courage  for  this  daring  exploit,  as  well  as 
to  work  upon  his  soldiers,  he  pretended  that  he  had 
a  mission  from  Heaven  to  chastise  and  destroy  the 
new  Babylon.  In  his  Pannonian  forests  it  would 
seem  he  had  heard  mysterious  voices  which  said  to 
him  :  *'  Advance,  and  thou  shalt  destroy  the 
city  !  " 

This  leader  of  clans  had  nothing  of  the  conqueror 
about  him.  He  understood  that  he  was  in  no  wise 
cut  out  to  wear  the  purple  ;  he  himself  felt  the 
Barbarian's  cureless  inferiority.  But  he  also  felt 
that  neither  was  he  born  to  obey.  If  he  asked  for 
the  title  of  Prefect  of  the  City,  and  if  he  persisted  in 
offering  his  services  to  the  Empire,  it  was  as  a  means 
to  get  the  upper  hand  of  it  more  surely.  Repulsed, 
disdained  by  the  Court,  he  tried  to  raise  himself  in 
his  own  eyes  and  in  the  eyes  of  the  common  people 
by  giving  himself  the  airs  of  an  instrument  of  justice, 
a  man  designed  by  fate,  who  marches  blindly  to  a 
terrible  purpose  indicated  by  the  divine  wrath.  It 
often   happened   that   he   was   duped   by   his   own 


338  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

mummery.     This  turbid  Barbarian  soul  was  prone 
to  the  most  superstitious  terrors. 

Notwithstanding  his  rodomontades,  it  is  certain 
that  in  his  heart  he  was  scared  by  Rome.  He 
hardly  dared  to  attack  it.  In  the  first  place,  it 
was  not  at  all  a  convenient  operation  for  him.  His 
army  of  mercenaries  had  no  proper  implements  to 
undertake  the  siege  of  this  huge  city,  of  which  the 
defence  lines  were  thrown  out  in  so  wide  a  perimeter. 
He  had  to  come  back  to  it  twice,  before  he  could 
make  up  his  mind  to  invest  it  seriously.  The  first 
time,  in  408,  he  was  satisfied  with  starving  the 
Romans  by  cutting  off  the  food  supply.  He  had 
pitched  his  camp  on  the  banks  of  the  Tiber  in  such 
a  way  as  to  capture  the  shipping  between  the 
capital  and  the  great  store-houses  built  near  the 
mouth  of  the  river.  From  the  ramparts,  the  Romans 
could  see  the  Barbarian  soldiers  moving  about,  ^vith 
their  sheepskin  coats  dyed  to  a  crude  red.  Panic- 
stricken,  the  aristocracy  fled  to  its  villas  in  Cam- 
pania, or  Sicily,  or  Africa.  They  took  with  them 
whatever  they  were  able  to  carry.  They  sought 
refuge  in  the  nearest  islands,  even  in  Sardinia  and 
Corsica,  despite  their  reputation  for  unhealthiness. 
They  even  hid  among  the  rocks  of  the  seashore. 
The  terror  was  so  great  that  the  Senate  agreed  to 
everything  demanded  by  Alaric.  He  was  paid  an 
enormous  indemnity  which  he  claimed  as  a  con- 
dition of  his  withdrawal. 

The  following  year  he  used  the  same  method  of 
intimidation  to  force  on  the  people  an  emperor  he 
had  chosen,  and  to  get  conferred  on  him  the  title  of 
Prefect  of  the  City  which  he  had  desired  so  long. 
Finally,  in  the  year  410,  he  struck  the  supreme  blow. 


THE  SACK   OF  ROME  339 

The  Barbarian  knew  what  he  was  about,  and 
that  he  did  not  risk  much  in  blockading  Rome. 
Famine  would  open  the  gates  to  him  sooner  or  later. 
All  who  were  able  had  left  the  city,  especially  the 
rich.  There  was  no  garrison  to  defend  it.  Only  a 
lazy  populace  remained  behind  the  walls,  unused  to 
arms,  and  still  more  enfeebled  by  long  starvation. 
And  yet  this  wretched  and  decimated  population, 
in  an  outburst  of  patriotism,  resisted  with  desperate 
energy.  The  siege  was  long.  Doubtless  it  began 
before  the  spring  ;  it  ended  only  at  the  end  of  the 
summer.  In  the  night  of  the  twenty-fourth  of 
August,  410,  amid  the  glare  of  lightning  and  crashes 
of  thunder,  Alaric  entered  Rome  by  the  Salarian 
gate.  It  is  certain  that  he  only  managed  it  even 
then  by  treachery.    The  prey  was  handed  to  him. 

The  sack  of  Rome  seems  to  have  lasted  for  three 
days  and  three  nights.  Part  of  the  town  was  burned. 
The  conquered  people  underwent  all  the  horrors 
which  accompany  such  events — violent  and  stupid 
destruction,  rapes,  murders  of  individuals,  whole- 
sale slaughter,  torture,  and  mutilation.  But  in 
reality  the  Barbarians  only  wanted  the  Roman 
gold.  They  acted  like  perfect  highway  robbers.  If 
they  tortured  their  victims  without  distinction  of 
age  or  sex,  it  was  to  pluck  the  secret  of  their  treasure- 
houses  out  of  them.  It  is  even  said  that  in  these 
conditions  the  Roman  avarice  produced  some  ad- 
mirable examples  of  firmness.  Some  let  themselves 
be  tortured  to  their  last  gasp  rather  than  reveal 
where  their  treasures  were  hid.  At  last,  when 
Alaric  decided  that  his  army  was  gorged  enough 
with  spoil,  he  gave  the  order  to  evacuate  the  city, 
and  took  to  the  roads  with  his  baggage-waggons  full. 


340  SAINT   AUGUSTIN 

Let  us  be  careful  not  to  judge  these  doings  after 
our  modern  notions.  The  capture  of  Rome  by  Alaric 
was  not  a  national  disaster.  It  was  plundering  on 
a  huge  scale.  The  Goth  had  no  thought  at  all  of 
destroying  the  Empire.  He  was  only  a  mercenary 
in  rebellion — an  ambitious  mercenary,  no  doubt — 
but,  above  all,  a  looter. 

As  a  consequence  of  this  attack  on  the  Eternal 
City,  one  after  another  caught  the  disease  of  plunder, 
which  contaminated  even  the  functionaries  and  the 
subjects  of  Rome.  Amid  the  general  anarchy,  where 
impunity  seemed  certain,  nobody  restrained  himself 
any  longer.  In  Africa  especially,  where  the  old 
instinct  of  piracy  is  alwaj^s  half -awake,  they  applied 
themselves  to  ransack  the  fugitive  Romans  and 
Italians.  Many  rich  people  were  come  there,  seek- 
ing a  place  of  safety  in  the  belief  that  they  would 
be  more  secure  when  they  had  put  the  sea  between 
themselves  and  the  Barbarians.  The  report  of  their 
riches  had  preceded  them,  exaggerated  out  of  all 
measure  by  popular  rumour.  Among  them  were 
mentioned  patricians  such  as  the  Anicii,  whose 
property  was  so  immense  and  their  palaces  so 
splendid  that  they  could  not  find  purchasers.  These 
multi-millionaires  in  flight  were  a  miraculous  wind- 
fall for  the  country.  They  were  bled  without 
mercy. 

Quicker  than  any  one  else,  the  military  governor 
of  Africa,  Count  Heraclianus,  was  on  the  spot  to 
j  pick  the  pockets  of  the  Italian  immigrants.  No 
!  sooner  were  they  off  the  boat  than  he  had  very  dis- 
;'  tinguished  ladies  seized,  and  only  released  them 
•  when  he  had  extorted  a  large  ransom.  He  sold 
'  those  unable  to  pay  to  the  Greek  and  Syrian  slave- 


THE   SACK   OF   ROME  341 

merchants    who    provided    human    flesh    for    the 
Oriental  harems.     When  the  example  came  from 
such  a  height,  the  subordinates  doubtless  said  to 
themselves  that  they  would  be  very  wrong  to  have 
the  least  shame.     From  one  end  of  the  province  to 
the  other,  everybody  struggled  to  extract  as  much 
as  possible  from  the  unfortunate  fugitives.    Angus- f 
tin's  own  parishioners  at  Hippo  undertook  to  tear; 
a    donation    from    one    of    those    gorgeous    Anicii,' 
whose  lands  stretched  further  than  a  kite  could  fly 
— from    Pinian,    the   husband   of   St.    Melania   the 
younger.    They  wanted  to  force  him  to  be  ordained ' 
priest  in  spite  of  himself,  which,  as  has  been  ex- 
plained, involved  the  handing  over  of  his  goods  to 
the  Catholic  community.     Augustin,  who  opposed 
this,  had  to  give  in  to  the  crowd.    There  was  almost 
a  riot  in  the  basilica. 

Such  were  the  far-off  reverberations  of  the  cap- 
ture of  Rome  by  Alaric.  Carthaginians  and  Nu- 
midians  pillaged  the  Romans  just  like  the  Barbarians. 

Now,  how  did  it  come  about  that  this  monstrous 
loot  took  on  before  the  eyes  of  contemporaries  the 
magnitude  of  a  world-catastrophe  ?  For  really 
nothing  was  utterly  lost.  The  Empire  remained 
standing.  After  Alaric's  retreat,  the  Romans  had 
come  back  to  their  city  and  they  worked  to  build 
up  the  ruins.  Ere  long,  the  populace  were  crying 
out  loud  that  if  the  circus  and  amphitheatre  games 
were  given  back  to  them,  they  would  look  upon 
the  descent  of  the  Goths  as  a  bad  dream. 

It  is  no  less  certain  that  this  sensational  occurrence 
had  struck  the  whole  Mediterranean  world  into  a 
perfect  stupor.  It  seized  upon  the  imaginations  of 
all.    The  idea  that  Rome  could  not  be  taken,  that 


342  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

it  was  integral  and  almost  sacred,  had  such  a  hold 
on  people's  minds,  that  they  refused  to  credit  the 
sinister  news.  Nobody  reflected  that  the  sack  of 
Rome  by  the  Barbarians  should  have  been  long 
ago  foreseen — that  Rome,  deprived  of  a  garrison, 
abandoned  by  the  Imperial  army,  was  bound  to 
attract  the  covetousness  of  the  Goths,  and  that  the 
pillage  of  a  place  without  defence,  already  enfeebled 
by  famine,  was  not  a  very  glorious  feat,  very  diffi- 
cult, or  very  extraordinary.  People  only  saw  the 
brutal  fact :  the  Eternal  City  had  been  captured  and 
burned  by  the  mercenaries.  All  were  under  the 
influence  of  the  shock  caused  by  the  narratives  of 
the  refugees.  In  one  of  his  sermons,  Augustin  has 
transmitted  to  us  an  echo  of  the  general  panic : 

"  Horrible  things,"  said  he,  "  have  been  told  us. 
There  have  been  ruins,  and  fires,  and  rapine,  and 
murder,  and  torture.  That  is  true  ;  we  have  heard 
it  many  times ;  we  have  shuddered  at  all  this 
disaster  ;  we  have  often  wept,  and  we  have  hardly 
been  able  to  console  ourselves." 

This  capture  of  Rome  was  plainly  a  terrible 
warning  for  the  future.  But  party  spirit  strangely 
exaggerated  the  importance  and  meaning  of  the 
calamity.  For  pagans  and  Christians  alike  it 
became  a  subject  for  speeches,  a  commonplace  of 
religious  polemic.  Both  saw  the  event  as  a  mani- 
festation of  the  wrath  of  Heaven. 

"  While  we  sacrificed  to  our  gods,"  the  pagan 
said,  "  Rome  was  standing,  Rome  was  happy.  Now 
that  our  sacrifices  are  forbidden,  you  see  what  has 
become  of  Rome.  ..." 

And  they  went  about  repeating  that  Christianism 
was  responsible  for  the  ruin  of  the  Empire. 


THE  SACK   OF   ROME  343 

On  their  side,  the  Christians  answered  :  In  the 
first  place,  Rome  has  not  fallen  :  it  is  always  stand- 
ing. It  has  been  only  chastised,  and  this  happened 
because  it  is  still  half  pagan.  By  this  frightful 
punishment  (and  they  heightened  the  description 
of  the  horrors  committed),  God  has  given  it  a 
warning.  Let  it  be  converted,  let  it  return  to  the 
virtues  of  its  ancestors,  and  it  will  become  again  the 
mistress  of  nations. 

There  is  what  Augustin  and  the  bishops  said. 
Still,  the  flock  of  the  faithful  were  only  half  con- 
vinced. It  was  all  well  enough  to  remonstrate  to 
them  that  the  Christians  of  Rome,  and  even  a  good 
number  of  pagans,  had  been  spared  at  the  name  of 
Christ,  and  that  the  Barbarian  leader  had  bestowed 
a  quite  special  protection  and  respect  upon  the 
basilicas  of  the  holy  apostles  ;  it  was  impossible  to 
prevent  their  thinking  that  many  Christians  had 
perished  in  the  sack  of  the  city,  that  consecrated 
virgins  had  experienced  the  last  outrages,  and  that, 
as  a  matter  of  fact,  all  the  inhabitants  had  been 
robbed  of  their  property.  .  .  .  Was  it  thus  that 
God  protected  His  chosen  ?  What  advantage  was 
there  in  being  Christian  if  they  had  the  same  treat- 
ment as  the  idolaters  ? 

This  state  of  mind  became  extremely  favourable 
for  paganism  to  come  back  again  on  the  offensive. 
Since  the  very  hard  laws  of  Theodosius,  which  for- 
bade the  worship  of  the  ancient  gods,  even  within 
the  house,  the  pagans  had  not  overlooked  any 
chance  to  protest  against  the  Imperial  severity.  At 
Carthage  there  were  always  fights  in  the  streets 
between  pagans  and  Christians,  not  to  say  riots. 
In   the   colony   of   Suffetula,  sixty  Christians   had 


344  SAINT   AUGUSTIN 

been  massacred.  The  year  before  the  capture  of 
Rome,  there  had  been  trouble  with  the  pagans  at 
Guelma.  Houses  belonging  to  the  Church  were 
burned,  a  monk  killed  in  a  brawl.  Whenever  the 
Government  inspection  relaxed,  or  the  political  situa- 
tion appeared  favourable,  the  pagans  hurried  to 
proclaim  their  belief.  Only  just  lately,  in  Rome 
beleaguered  by  Alaric,  the  new  consul,  Tertullus, 
had  thought  fit  to  revive  the  old  customs.  Before 
assuming  office,  he  studied  gravely  the  sacred  fowls 
in  their  cages,  traced  circles  in  the  sky  with  the 
augur's  wand,  and  marked  the  flight  of  birds. 
Besides,  a  pagan  oracle  circulated  persistently  among 
the  people,  promising  that  after  a  reign  of  three  hun- 
dred and  sixty-five  j^ears  Christianity  would  be  con- 
quered. The  centuries  of  the  great  desolation  were 
fulfilled  ;  the  era  of  revenge  was  about  to  begin  for 
the  outcast  gods. 

These  warlike  symptoms  did  not  escape  Augus- 
tin's  vigilance.  His  indignation  no  longer  arose  only 
from  the  fact  that  paganism  was  so  slow  in  dying  ; 
he  was  now  afraid  that  the  feebleness  of  the  Empire 
might  allow  it  to  take  on  an  appearance  of  life.  It 
must  be  ended,  as  Donatism  had  been  ended.  The 
old  apostle  was  summoned  to  a  new  campaign,  and 
in  it  he  would  spend  the  best  of  his  strength  to  the 
eve  of  his  death. 


II 

THE   CITY   OF   GOD 

FOR  thirteen  or  fourteen  years,  through  a 
thousand  employments  and  a  thousand  cares, 
amid  the  panics  and  continual  alarums  which  kept 
the  Africans  on  the  alert  in  those  times,  Augustin 
worked  at  his  City  of  God,  the  most  formidable 
machine  of  war  ever  directed  against  paganism, 
and  also  the  arsenal  fullest  of  proofs  and  refutations 
which  the  disputants  and  defenders  of  Catholicism 
have  ever  had  at  their  disposal. 

It  is  not  for  us  to  examine  the  details  of  this 
immense  work,  for  our  sole  aim  is  to  study  Augus- 
tin's  soul,  and  we  quote  scarcely  anything  from  his 
books  save  those  parts  wherein  a  little  of  this  ardent 
soul  pulsates — those  which  are  still  living  for  us 
of  the  twentieth  century,  which  contain  teachings 
and  ways  of  feeling  still  likely  to  move  us.  Now, 
Augustin's  attitude  towards  paganism  is  one  of 
those  which  throw  the  greatest  light  on  his  nature 
and  character.  And  it  may  even  yet  come  to  be 
our  own  attitude  when  we  find  opposed  to  us  a  con- 
ception of  life  and  the  world  which  may  indeed 
be  ruined  for  a  time,  but  is  reborn  as  soon  as  the  sense 
of  spirituality  disappears  or  grows  feeble. 

"  Immortal  Paganism,  art  thou  dead  ?     So  they  say. 
But  Pan  55coffs  under  his  breath,  and  the  Chimera  laughs."  * 
*  Sainte-Beuve. 
345 


346  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

Like  ourselves,  Augustin,  brought  up  by  a  Chris- 
tian mother,  knew  it  only  through  literature,  and, 
so  to  speak,  aestheticalty.  Recollections  of  school, 
the  emotions  and  admirations  of  a  cultivated  man — 
there  is  what  the  old  religion  meant  for  him.  Never- 
theless, he  had  one  great  advantage  over  us  for 
knowing  it  well :  the  sight  of  the  pagan  customs  and 
superstitions  was  still  under  his  eyes. 

That  the  lascivious,  romantic,  and  poetic  adven- 
tures of  the  ancient  gods,  their  statues,  their  temples, 
and  all  the  arts  arising  from  their  religion,  had  be- 
guiled him  and  filled  him  with  enthusiasm  before  his 
conversion,  is  only  too  certain.  But  all  this  myth- 
ology and  plastic  art  were  looked  upon  as  secondary 
things  then,  even  by  pagans.  The  serious,  the  essen- 
tial part  of  the  religion  was  not  in  that.  Paganism, 
a  religion  of  Beauty,  is  an  invention  of  our  modern 
aesthetes  ;  it  was  hardly  thought  of  in  that  way  in 
Augustin's  time. 

Long  before  this,  the  Roman  Varro,  the  great 
compiler  of  the  religious  antiquities  of  paganism, 
made  a  threefold  distinction  of  the  doctrine  con- 
cerning the  gods.  The  first — that  of  the  theatre, 
as  he  calls  it,  or  fabulous  mythology,  adapted  to 
poets,  dramatists,  sculptors,  and  jesters.  Invented 
by  these,  it  is  only  a  fantasy,  a  play  of  imagination, 
an  ornament  of  life.  The  third  is  civil  theology, 
serious  and  solid,  which  claims  the  respect  and 
piety  of  all.  "It  is  that  which  men  in  cities,  and 
chiefly  the  priests,  ought  to  he  cunning  in.  It  teaches 
which  gods  to  worship  in  public,  and  with  what 
ceremonies  and  sacrifices  each  one  must  be  served." 
Finally,  the  second,  physical  or  metaphysical  theo- 
logy, is  reserved  for  philosophers  and  exceptional 


THE  CITY   OF  GOD  347 

minds ;  it  is  altogether  theoretical.  The  only  impor- 
tant and  truty  religious  one,  which  puts  an  obligation 
on  the  believer,  is  the  third — the  civil  theology. 

Now,  we  never  take  account  of  this.  What  we 
persist  in  regarding  as  paganism  is  what  Varro 
himself  called  "  a  religion  for  the  theatre  " — 
matter  of  opera,  pretext  for  ballets,  for  scenery,  and 
for  dance  postures.  Transposed  into  another  key 
by  our  poets,  this  mythology  is  inflated  now  and 
then  by  mysticism,  or  by  a  vague  symbolism. 
Playthings  of  our  pretty  wits  !  The  living  paganism, 
which  Augustin  struggled  against,  which  crowds 
defended  at  the  price  of  their  blood,  in  which  the 
poor  believed  and  the  wisest  statesmen  deemed  in- 
dispensable as  a  safeguard  of  cities — that  paganism 
is  quite  another  matter.  Like  all  religions  which 
are  possible,  it  implied  and  it  enforced  not  onl}^ 
beliefs,  but  ritual,  sacrifices,  festivals.  And  this  is 
what  Augustin,  with  the  other  Christians  of  that 
time,  spurned  with  disgust  and  declared  to  be  un- 
bearable. 

He  saw,  or  he  had  seen  with  his  own  eyes,  the 
reality  of  the  pagan  worship,  and  the  most  re- 
pellent of  all  to  our  modern  delicacy — the  sacrifices. 
At  the  period  when  he  wrote  The  City  of  God,  private 
sacrifices,  as  well  as  public,  were  forbidden.  This 
did  not  prevent  the  devout  from  breaking  the  law 
whenever  a  chance  offered.  They  hid  themselves 
more  or  less  when  they  sacrificed  before  a  temple, 
a  chapel,  or  on  some  private  estate.  The  rites  could 
not  be  carried  out  according  to  all  the  minute  in- 
structions of  the  pontifical  books.  It  was  no  more 
than  a  shadow  of  the  ceremonies  of  former  times. 
But  in  his  childhood,  in  the  reign  of   Julian,  for 


348  SAINT   AUGUSTIN 

instance,  Augustin  could  have  attended  sacrifices 
which  were  celebrated  with  full  pomp  and  according 
to  all  the  ritual  forms.  They  were  veritable  scenes  of 
butchery.  For  Heaven's  sake  let  us  forget  the  frieze 
of  the  Parthenon,  and  its  sacrificers  with  their  grace- 
ful lines  !  If  we  want  to  have  a  literal  translation 
of  this  sculpture,  and  find  the  modern  representation 
of  a  hecatomb,  we  must  go  to  the  slaughter-houses 
at  La  Villette. 

Among  the  heaps  of  broken  flesh,  the  puddles  of 
blood,  the  mystic  Julian  was  attacked  by  a  kind  of 
drunkenness.  There  were  never  enough  beasts 
strangled  or  slaughtered  to  suit  him.  Nothing 
satisfied  his  fury  for  sacred  carnage.  The  pagans 
themselves  made  fun  of  this  craze  for  sacrificing. 
During  the  three  years  his  reign  lasted  the  altars 
streamed  with  blood.  Oxen  by  hundreds  were 
slain  upon  the  floors  of  the  temples,  and  the  butchers 
throttled  so  many  sheep  and  other  domestic  animals 
that  they  gave  up  keeping  count  of  them.  Thousands 
of  white  birds,  pigeons  or  sea-gulls,  were  destroyed 
day  by  day  by  the  piety  of  the  prince.  He  was  called 
the  Vidimarius,  and  when  he  started  upon  his  cam- 
paign against  the  Persians,  an  epigram  was  circu- 
lated once  more  which  had  been  formerly  composed 
against  Marcus  Aurelius  (the  philosophic  emperor  !) 
who  was  equally  generous  of  hecatombs  :  "To 
Marcus  Caesar  from  the  white  oxen.  It  will  be  all 
over  with  us  if  you  come  back  a  conqueror."  People 
said  that  Julian,  on  his  return,  would  depopulate 
stables  and  pasture-lands. 

The  populace,  who  gathered  their  very  consider- 
able profit  from  these  butcheries,  natural^  en- 
couraged such  an  excess  of  devotion.     At  Rome, 


THE   CITY   OF  GOD  349 

under  Caligula,  more  than  a  hundred  and  sixty  thou- 
sand victims  were  immolated  in  three  months — nearly 
two  thousand  a  day.  And  these  massacres  took  place ' 
upon  the  approaches  of  the  temples  ;  in  the  middle  of 
the  city  ;  on  the  forums ;  in  narrow  squares  crowded 
with  public  buildings  and  statues.  Just  try  to  call 
up  the  scene  in  summer,  between  walls  at  a  white 
heat,  with  the  smells  and  the  flies.  Spectators  and 
victims  rubbed  against  one  another,  pressed  close  in 
the  restricted  space.  One  day,  Caligula,  while  he 
was  attending  a  sacrifice,  was  splashed  all  over  by  the 
blood  of  a  flamingo  as  they  cut  its  neck.  But  the 
august  Caesar  was  not  so  fastidious  ;  he  himself 
operated  in  these  ceremonies  armed  with  a  mallet 
and  clad  in  the  short  shirt  of  the  killers.  The 
ignominy  of  all  this  revolted  the  Christians,  and 
whoever  had  nerves  at  all  sensitive.  The  bloody 
mud  in  which  passers  slipped,  the  hissing  of  the  fat, 
the  heavy  odour  of  flesh,  were  sickening.  Tertullian  | 
held  his  nose  before  the  "  stinking  fires  "  on  which  ' 
the  victims  were  roasting.  And  St.  Ambrose  com- 
plained that  in  the  Roman  Curia  the  senators  who  \ 
were  Christians  were  obliged  to  breathe  in  the 
smoke  and  receive  full  in  the  face  the  ashes  of  the 
altar  raised  before  the  statue  of  Victory. 

The  manipulations  of  the  haruspicina  seemed  an 
even  worse  abomination  in  the  eyes  of  the  Christians. 
Dissection  of  bowels,  examination  of  entrails,  were 
practices  very  much  in  fashion  in  all  classes  of 
society.  The  pagans  generally  took  more  or  less 
interest  in  magic.  One  was  scarcely  a  philosopher 
without  being  a  miracle-worker.  In  this  there 
was  a  kind  of  perfidious  rivalry  to  the  Christian 
miracles.    The  ambitious  or  the  discontented  opened 


350  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

the  bellies  of  animals  to  learn  when  the  Emperor 
was  going  to  die,  and  who  would  succeed  him.  But 
although  it  did  not  pretend  to  magic,  the  haruspicina 
made  an  essential  part  of  the  sacrifices.  As  soon  as 
the  dismemberment  was  done,  the  diviners  examined 
the  appearance  of  the  entrails.  Consulting  together, 
they  turned  them  over  frequently  with  anxious  at- 
tention. This  business  might  continue  for  a  long 
time.  Plutarch  relates  that  Philip,  King  of  Mace- 
donia, when  sacrificing  an  ox  on  the  Ithomsea,  with 
Aratus  of  Sicyon  and  Demetrius  of  Pharos,  wished 
to  inquire  out  from  the  entrails  of  the  victim  con- 
cerning the  wisdom  of  a  piece  of  strategy.  The 
hamspex  put  the  smoking  mass  in  his  hands.  The 
King  shewed  it  to  his  companions,  who  derived 
contradictory  presages  from  it.  He  listened  to  one 
side  and  the  other,  holding  meanwhile  the  ox's 
entrails  in  his  hands.  Eventually,  he  decided  for  the 
opinion  of  Aratus,  and  then  tranquilly  gave  the 
handful  back  to  the  sacrificer.  .  .  . 

No  doubt  in  Augustin's  time  these  rites  were  no 
longer  practised  openly.  For  all  that,  they  were 
of  the  first  importance  in  the  ancient  religion,  which 
desired  nothing  better  than  to  restore  them.  It  is 
easy  to  understand  the  repulsion  they  caused  in 
the  author  of  The  City  of  God.  He  who  would  not 
have  a  fly  killed  to  make  sure  of  the  gold  crown  in 
the  contest  of  poets,  looked  with  horror  on  these 
sacred  butchers,  and  manglers,  and  cooks.  He 
flung  the  garbage  of  the  sacrifices  into  the  sewer, 
and  shewed  proudly  to  the  pagans  the  pure  oblation 
of  the  eucharistic  Bread  and  Wine. 

But  what,  above  all,  he  attacked,  because  it  was 
a  present  and  permanent  scandal,  was  the  gluttony, 


THE  CITY   OF  GOD  351 

the  drunkenness,  and  lust  of  the  pagans.  Let  us 
not  exaggerate  these  vices — not  the  two  first,  at 
least.  Augustin  could  not  judge  them  as  we  can. 
It  is  certain  that  the  Africans  of  his  time — and  for 
that  matter,  those  of  to-day — would  have  struck  us 
modern  people  as  very  sober.  The  outbursts  of 
intemperance  which  he  accuses  them  of  only  hap- 
pened at  intervals,  at  times  of  public  festivity  or 
some  family  celebration.  But  as  soon  as  they  did 
begin  the}^  were  terrible.  When  one  thinks  of  the 
orgies  of  our  Arabs  behind  locked  doors  ! 

But  it  is  no  less  true  that  the  pagan  vices  spread 
themselves  out  cynically  under  the  protecting 
shadow  of  religion.  Popular  souses  of  eating  and 
drinking  were  the  obligatory  accompaniments  of 
the  festivals  and  sacrifices.  A  religious  festival 
meant  a  carouse,  loads  of  victuals,  barrels  of  wine 
broached  in  the  street.  These  were  called  the 
Dishes,  Fercula,  or  else,  the  Rejoicing,  LcBtitia. 
The  poor  people,  who  knew  meat  only  by  sight, 
ate  it  on  these  days,  and  they  drank  wine.  The 
effect  of  this  unaccustomed  plenty  was  felt  at  once. 
The  whole  populace  were  drunk.  The  rich  in  their 
houses  possibly  did  it  with  more  ceremony,  but  it 
was  really  the  same  brutishness.  The  elegant 
Ovid,  who  in  the  Art  of  Love  teaches  fine  manners 
to  the  beginners  in  love,  advises  them  not  to  vomit 
at  table,  and  to  avoid  getting  drunk  like  the 
husbands  of  their  mistresses. 

Plainly,  religion  was  only  an  excuse  for  these  ex- 
cesses. Augustin  goes  too  far  when  he  makes  the 
gods  responsible  for  this  riot  of  sensuality.  What 
is  true  is  that  they  did  nothing  to  hinder  it.  And  it 
is  also  true  that  the  lechery,  which  he  flings  so  acridly 


352  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

in  the  face  of  the  pagans,  the  gross  stage-plays,  the 
songs,  dances,  and  even  prostitution,  were  all  more 
or  less  included  in  the  essence  of  paganism.  The 
theatre,  like  the  games  of  the  arena  and  circus,  was 
a  divine  institution.  At  certain  feasts,  and  in  cer- 
tain temples,  fornication  became  sacred.  All  the 
world  knew  what  took  place  at  Carthage  in  the 
courts  and  under  the  porticoes  of  the  Celestial 
Virgin,  and  what  the  ears  of  the  most  chaste  matrons 
were  obliged  to  hear,  and  also  what  the  use  was  of 
the  castrated  priests  of  the  Great  Mother  of  the  gods. 
Augustin,  who  declaims  against  these  filthy  sports, 
has  not  forced  the  note  of  his  denunciation  to  make 
out  a  good  case.  If  anybody  wants  to  know  in  more 
detail  the  sights  enjoyed  at  the  theatre,  or  what 
were  the  habits  of  certain  pious  confraternities,  he 
has  only  to  read  what  is  told  by  Apuleius,  the  most 
devout  of  pagans.  He  takes  evident  pleasure  in 
these  stories,  or,  if  he  sometimes  waxes  indignant, 
it  is  the  depravity  of  men  he  accuses.  The  gods 
soar  at  a  great  height  above  these  wretched  trifles. 
To  Augustin,  on  the  contrary,  the  gods  are  un- 
clean devils  who  fill  their  bellies  with  lust  and 
obscenities,  as  if  they  were  hankering  for  the  blood 
and  grease  of  sacrifices. 

And  so  he  puts  his  finger  on  the  open  wound  of 
paganism — its  basic  immorality,  or,  if  you  like, 
its  unmorality.  Like  our  scientism  of  to-day,  it 
was  unable  to  lay  down  a  system  of  morals.  It 
did  not  even  try  to.  What  Augustin  has  written 
on  this  subject  in  The  City  of  God,  is  perhaps  the 
strongest  argument  ever  objected  to  polytheism. 
Anyhow,  pages  like  this  are  very  timely  indeed  to 
consider  : 


THE  CITY   OF  GOD  353 

"  But  such  friends  and  such  worshippers  of  those 
gods,  whom  they  rejoice  to  follow  and  imitate  in  all 
villainies  and  mischiefs — do  they  trouble  themselves 
about  the  corruption  and  great  decay  of  the  Re- 
public ?  Not  so.  Let  it  but  stand,  say  they  ;  let 
it  but  prosper  by  the  number  of  its  troops  and  be 
glorious  by  its  victories  ;  or,  which  is  best  of  all,  let 
it  hut  enjoy  security  and  peace,  and  what  care  we  ? 
Yes,  what  we  care  for  above  all  is  that  every  one 
may  have  the  means  to  increase  his  wealth,  to  pay 
the  expenses  of  his  usual  luxury,  and  that  the  power- 
ful may  still  keep  under  the  weak.  Let  the  poor 
crouch  to  the  rich  to  be  fed,  or  to  live  at  ease  under 
their  protection  ;  let  the  rich  abuse  the  poor  as 
things  at  their  service,  and  to  shew  how  many  they 
have  soliciting  them.  Let  the  people  applaud  such 
as  provide  them  with  pleasures,  not  such  as  have 
a  care  for  their  interests.  Let  naught  that  is  hard  be 
enjoined,  nothing  impure  be  prohibited.  .  .  .  Let  not 
subdued  provinces  obey  their  governors  as  super- 
visors of  their  morality,  but  as  masters  of  their  for- 
tune and  the  procurers  of  their  pleasures.  What 
matters  it  if  this  submission  has  no  sincerity,  but  rests 
upon  a  bad  and  servile  fear !  Let  the  law  protect  estates 
rather  than  fair  justice.  Let  there  be  a  good  number 
of  public  harlots,  either  for  all  that  please  to  enjoy 
themselves  in  their  company,  or  for  those  that  can- 
not keep  private  ones.  Let  stately  and  sumptuous 
houses  be  erected,  so  that  night  and  day  each  one 
according  to  his  liking  or  his  means  may  gamble 
and  drink  and  revel  and  vomit.  Let  the  rhythmed 
tinkling  of  dances  be  ordinary,  the  cries,  the  un- 
controlled delights,  the  uproar  of  all  pleasures,  even 
the  bloodiest  and  most  shameful  in  the  theatres.    He 

2   A 


354  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

who  shall  assay  to  dissuade  from  these  pleasures, 
let  him  be  condemned  as  a  public  enemy.  And  if 
any  one  try  to  alter  or  suppress  them — let  the 
people  stifle  his  voice,  let  them  banish  him,  let  them 
kill  him.  On  the  other  hand,  those  that  shall  pro- 
cure the  people  these  pleasures,  and  authorize  their 
enjoyment,  let  them  be  eternized  for  the  true 
gods."  .  .  . 

However,  Augustin  acknowledges  a  number  of 
praiseworthy  minds  among  pagans — those  philos- 
ophers, with  Plato  in  the  first  rank,  who  have  done 
their  best  to  put  morality  into  the  religion.  The 
Christian  teacher  renders  a  magnificent  tribute  to 
Platonism.  But  these  high  doctrines  have  scarcely 
got  beyond  the  portals  of  the  schools,  and  this  moral 
teaching  which  paganism  vaunts  of,  is  practically 
limited  to  the  sanctuaries.  *'  Let  them  not  talk," 
says  he,  "  of  some  closely  muttered  instructions, 
taught  in  secret,  and  whispered  in  the  ear  of  a  few 
adepts,  which  hold  I  know  not  what  lessons  of 
uprightness  and  virtue.  But  let  them  shew  the 
temples  ordained  for  such  pious  meetings,  wherein 
were  no  sports  with  lascivious  gestures  and  loose 
songs.  .  .  .  Let  them  shew  us  the  places  where  the 
gods'  doctrine  was  heard  against  covetousness,  the 
suppression  of  ambition,  the  bridling  of  luxury,  and 
where  wretches  might  learn  what  the  poet  Persius 
thunders  unto  them,  saying  : 

'  Learn,  wretches,  and  conceive  the  course  of  things, 
What  man  is,  and  why  nature  forth  him  brings  ;  .  .  . 
How  to  use  money  ;  how  to  help  a  friend  ; 
What  we  on  earth,  and  God  in  us,  intend.' 

Let  them  shew  where  their  instructing  gods  were 
used  to  give  such  lessons  ;    and  where  their  wor- 


THE   CITY   OF   GOD  355 

shippers  used  to  go  often  to  hear  these  matters.  As 
for  us,  we  can  point  to  our  churches,  built  for  this 
sole  purpose,  wheresoever  the  religion  of  Christ  is 
diffused." 

Can  it  surprise,  then,  if  men  so  ignorant  of  high 
morality,  and  so  deeply  embedded  in  matter, 
were  also  plunged  in  the  grossest  superstitions  ? 
Materialism  in  morals  alwa3^s  ends  by  producing 
a  low  credulity.  Here  Augustin  triumphs.  He 
sends  marching  under  our  eyes,  in  a  burlesque 
array,  the  innumerable  army  of  gods  whom  the 
Romans  believed  in.  There  are  so  many  that  he 
compares  them  to  swarms  of  gnats.  Although  he 
explains  that  he  is  not  able  to  mention  them  all, 
he  amuses  himself  by  stupefying  us  with  the  pro- 
digious number  of  those  he  discovers.  Dragged 
into  open  day  by  him,  a  whole  divine  population  is 
brought  out  of  the  darkness  and  forgetfulness  where 
it  had  been  sleeping  perhaps  for  centuries  :  the  little 
gods  who  work  in  the  fields,  who  make  the  corn 
grow  and  keep  off  the  blight,  those  who  watch  over 
children,  who  aid  women  in  labour,  who  protect 
the  hearth,  who  guard  the  house.  It  was  impossible 
to  take  a  step  among  the  pagans,  to  make  a  move- 
ment, without  the  help  of  a  god  or  goddess.  Men 
and  things  were  as  if  fettered  and  imprisoned  by  the 
gods. 

"  In  a  house,"  says  Augustin  scoffingly,  "  there 
is  but  one  porter.  He  is  but  a  mere  man,  yet  he  is 
sufficient  for  that  office.  But  it  takes  three  gods, 
Forculus  for  the  door,  Cardea  for  the  hinge,  Limen- 
tinus  for  the  threshold.  Doubtless,  Forculus  all  alone 
could  not  possibly  look  after  threshold,  door  and 
hinges."     And  if  it  is  a  case  of  a  man  and  woman 


356  SAINT   AUGUSTIN 

retiring  to  the  bridal  chamber  after  the  wedding,  a 
whole  squadron  of  divinities  are  set  in  motion  for 
an  act  so  simple  and  natural.  "  I  beseech  you,"  cries 
Augustin,  "  leave  something  for  the  husband  to  do  !  " 

This  African,  who  had  such  a  strong  sense  of  the 
unity  and  fathomless  infinity  of  God,  waxed  in- 
dignant at  this  sacrilegious  parcelling  of  the  divine 
substance.  But  the  pagans,  following  Varro,  would 
answer  that  it  was  necessary  to  distinguish,  among 
all  these  gods,  those  who  were  just  the  imagination 
of  poets,  and  those  who  were  real  beings — between 
the  gods  of  fable  and  the  gods  of  religion.  "  Then," 
as  Tertulhan  had  said  already,  "  if  the  gods  be 
chosen  as  onions  are  roped,  it  is  obvious  that  what 
is  not  chosen  is  condemned."  "  Tertullian  carries 
his  fancy  too  far,"  comments  Augustin.  The  gods 
refused  as  fabulous  are  not  held  reprobate  on  that 
account.  The  truth  is,  the}^  are  a  cut  of  the  same 
piece  as  the  admitted  gods.  ''  Have  not  the  pontiffs, 
like  the  poets,  a  bearded  Jupiter  and  a  Mercury 
without  beard  ?  .  .  .  Are  the  old  Saturn  and  the 
young  Apollo  so  much  the  property  of  the 
poets  that  we  do  not  see  their  statues  too  in  the 
temples  ?  .  .  ." 

And  the  philosophers,  in  their  turn,  however 
much  they  may  protest  against  the  heap  of  fabulous 
gods  and,  like  Plato  and  Porph3Ty,  declare  that 
there  exists  but  one  God,  soul  of  the  universe, 
yet  they  no  less  accepted  the  minor  gods,  and 
intermediaries  or  messengers  betwixt  gods  and 
men,  whom  they  called  demons.  These  hybrid 
beings,  who  pertained  to  humanity  by  their  passions, 
and  to  the  divinity  by  the  privilege  of  immortality, 
had  to  be  appeased  by  sacrifices,  questioned  and  grati- 


THE  CITY   OF  GOD  357 

fied  by  magic  spells.  And  there  is  what  the  highest 
pagan  wisdom  ended  in — yes,  in  calling  up  spirits, 
and  the  shady  operations  of  wizards  and  wonder- 
smiths.  That  is  what  the  pagans  defended,  and 
demanded  the  continuation  of  with  so  much  ob- 
stinacy and  fanaticism. 

By  no  means,  replied  Augustin.  It  does  not 
deserve  to  survive.  It  is  not  the  forsaking  of 
these  beliefs  and  superstitious  practices  which  has 
brought  about  the  decay  of  the  Empire.  If  you  are 
asking  for  the  temples  of  your  gods  to  be  opened, 
it  is  because  they  are  easy  to  your  passions.  At 
heart,  you  scoff  at  them  and  the  Empire  ;  all  you 
want  is  freedom  and  impunity  for  your  vices. 
There  we  have  the  real  cause  of  the  decadence  ! 
Little  matter  the  idle  grimaces  before  altars  and 
statues.  Become  chaste,  sober,  brave,  and  poor, 
as  your  ancestors  were.  Have  children,  agree  to 
compulsory  military  service,  and  you  will  conquer 
as  they  did.  Now,  all  these  virtues  are  enjoined 
and  encouraged  by  Christianity.  Whatever  certain 
heretics  may  say,  the  religion  of  Christ  is  not  con- 
trary to  marriage  or  the  soldier's  profession.  The 
Patriarchs  of  the  old  law  were  blest  in  marriage, 
and  there  are  just  and  holy  wars. 

And  even  supposing,  that  in  spite  of  all  efforts 
to  save  it,  the  Empire  is  condemned,  must  we 
therefore  despair  ?  We  should  be  prepared  for  the 
end  of  the  Roman  city.  Like  all  the  things  of  this 
world,  it  is  liable  to  old  age  and  death.  It  will 
die  then,  one  day.  Far  from  being  cast  down,  let 
us  strengthen  ourselves  against  this  disaster  by 
the  realization  of  the  eternal.  Let  us  strengthen 
our  hold  upon  that  which  passes  not.     Above  the 


358  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

earthly  city,  rises  the  City  of  God,  which  is  the 
communion  of  holy  souls,  the  only  one  which 
gives  complete  and  never-failing  joy.  Let  us  try 
to  be  the  citizens  of  that  city,  and  to  live  the  only  life 
worth  calling  life.  For  the  life  here  below  is  but  the 
shadow  of  a  shadow.  .  .  . 

The  people  of  those  times  were  wonderfully  pre- 
pared to  hearken  to  such  exhortations.  On  the  eve 
of  the  Barbarian  invasions,  these  Christians,  for 
whom  the  dogma  of  the  Resurrection  was  perhaps 
the  chief  reason  of  their  faith,  these  people,  sick 
at  heart,  who  looked  on  in  torture  at  the  ending  of 
a  world,  must  have  considered  this  present  life  as 
a  bad  dream,  from  which  there  should  be  no  delay  in 
escaping. 

At  the  very  moment  even  that  Augustin  began 
to  write  The  City  of  God,  his  friend  Evodius,  Bishop 
of  Uzalis,  told  him  this  story. 

He  had  as  secretary  a  very  young  man,  the  son 
of  a  priest  in  the  neighbourhood.  This  young  man 
had  begun  by  obtaining  a  post  as  stenographer  in 
the  office  of  the  Proconsul  of  Africa.  Evodius,  who 
was  alarmed  at  what  might  happen  to  his  virtue  in 
such  surroundings,  having  first  made  certain  of  his 
absolute  chastity,  offered  to  take  him  into  his 
service.  In  the  bishop's  house,  where  he  had 
scarcely  anything  to  do  but  read  the  Holy  Scripture, 
his  faith  became  so  enthusiastic  that  he  longed  for 
nothing  now  but  death.  To  go  out  of  this  life,  "  to 
be  with  Christ,''  was  his  eager  wish.  It  was  heard. 
After  sixteen  days  of  illness  he  died  in  the  house  of 
his  parents. 

"  Now,  two  days  after  his  funeral,  a  virtuous 
woman  of  Figes,  a  servant  of  God,  a  widow  for  twelve 


THE  CITY   OF  GOD  359 

years,  had  a  dream,  and  in  her  dream  she  saw  a 
deacon  who  had  been  dead  some  four  years,  together 
with  men,  and  women  too,  virgins  and  widows — she 
saw  these  servants  of  God  getting  ready  a  palace. 
This  dweUing  was  so  rich  that  it  shone  with  hght, 
and  you  would  have  believed  it  was  all  made  of 
silver.  And  when  the  widow  asked  whom  these 
preparations  were  for,  the  deacon  replied  that  they 
were  for  a  young  man,  dead  the  evening  before,  the 
son  of  a  priest.  In  the  same  palace,  she  saw  an  old 
man,  all  robed  in  white,  and  he  told  two  other 
persons,  also  robed  in  white,  to  go  to  the  tomb  of 
this  young  man,  and  lift  out  the  body,  and  carry 
it  to  Heaven.  When  the  body  had  been  drawn  from 
the  tomb  and  carried  to  Heaven,  there  arose  (said 
she)  out  of  the  tomb  a  bush  of  virgin-roses,  which 
are  thus  named  because  they  never  open.  ..." 

So  the  son  of  the  priest  had  chosen  the  better  part. 
What  was  the  good  of  remaining  in  this  abominable 
world,  where  there  was  always  a  risk  of  being 
burned  or  murdered  by  Goths  and  Vandals,  when, 
in  the  other  world,  angels  were  preparing  for  you 
palaces  of  light  ? 


Ill 

THE  BARBARIAN  DESOLATION 

AUGUSTIN  was  seventy-two  years  old  when  he 
L  finished  the  City  of  God.  This  was  in  426. 
That  year,  an  event  of  much  importance  occmTed 
at  Hippo,  and  the  report  of  it  was  inserted  in  the 
pubhc  acts  of  the  community. 

"  The  sixth  of  the  calends  of  October,"  The  Acts 
set  forth,  "  the  very  glorious  Theodosius  being 
consul  for  the  twelfth  time,  and  Valentinian  Augus- 
tus for  the  second,  Augustin  the  bishop,  accom- 
panied by  Religianus  and  Martinianus,  his  fellow- 
bishops,  having  taken  his  place  in  the  Basilica  of 
Peace  at  Hippo,  and  the  priests  Saturnius,  Leporius, 
Barnaby,  Fortunatianus,  Lazarus,  and  Heraclius, 
being  present,  with  all  the  clergy  and  a  vast  crowd 
of  people — Augustin  the  bishop  said  : 

"  '  Let  us  without  delay  look  to  the  business 
which  I  declared  3^estcrday  to  your  charity,  and 
for  which  I  desired  you  to  gather  here  in  large 
numbers,  as  I  see  you  have  done.  If  I  were  to  talk 
to  you  of  anything  else,  you  might  be  less  attentive, 
seeing  the  expectation  you  are  in. 

"  '  My  brothers,  we  are  all  mortal  in  this  life, 
and  no  man  knows  his  last  day.  God  willed  that  I 
should  come  to  dwell  in  this  town  in  the  force  of 
my  age.  But,  as  I  was  a  young  man  then — see,  I 
am  old  now,  and  as  I  know  that  at  the  death  of 

360 


THE   BARBARIAN   DESOLATION       361 

bishops,  peace  is  troubled  by  rivalry  or  ambition 
(this  have  I  often  seen  and  bewailed  it) — I  ought, 
so  far  as  it  rests  with  me,  to  turn  away  so  great  a 
mischief  from  your  city.  ...  I  am  going  then  to 
tell  you  that  my  will,  which  I  believe  also  to  be  the 
will  of  God,  is  that  I  have  as  successor  the  priest 
Heraclius.' 

"  At  these  words  all  the  people  cried  out  : 
"  '  Thanks  be  to  God  !    Praise  be  to  Christ  !  ' 
"  And  this  cry  they  repeated  three-and-twenty 
times. 

"  '  Christ,  hear  us  !     Preserve  us  Augustin  !  ' 
'*  This  cry  they  repeated  sixteen  times. 
"  '  Be  our  father  !     Be  our  bishop  !  ' 
"  This  cry  they  repeated  eight  times. 
"  When   the   people   became    silent,    the    bishop 
Augustin  spoke  again  in  these  words  : 

"  '  There  is  no  need  for  me  to  praise  Heraclius. 
As  much  as  I  do  justice  to  his  wisdom,  in  equal 
measure  should  I  spare  his  modesty.  ...  As  you 
perceive,  the  secretaries  of  the  church  gather  up 
what  we  say  and  what  you  say.  My  words  and  your 
shouts  do  not  fall  to  the  ground.  To  put  it  briefly, 
these  are  ecclesiastical  decrees  that  we  are  now 
drawing  up,  and  I  desire  b}^  these  means,  as  far  as 
it  is  in  the  power  of  man,  to  confirm  what  I  have 
declared  to  you.' 

"  Here  the  people  cried  out  : 

"  '  Thanks  be  to  God  !     Praise  be  to  Christ  !  ' 


"  '  Be  our  father,  and  let  Heraclius  be  our  bishop  !  ' 
"  When  silence  was   made    again,   Augustin  the 
bishop  thus  spoke  : 


362  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

"  '  I  understand  what  you  would  say.  But  I 
do  not  wish  that  it  happen  to  him  as  it  happened 
to  me.  Many  of  you  know  what  was  done  at  that 
time.  ...  I  was  consecrated  bishop  during  the 
hfetime  of  my  father  and  bishop,  the  aged  Valerius, 
of  blessed  memory,  and  with  him  I  shared  the  see. 
I  was  ignorant,  as  he  was,  that  this  was  forbidden 
by  the  Council  of  Nice.  I  would  not  therefore  that 
men  should  blame  in  Heraclius,  my  son,  what  they 
blamed  in  me.' 

"  With  that  the  people  cried  out  thirteen 
times  : 

"  '  Thanks  be  to  God  !    Praise  be  to  Christ  !  ' 

"  After  a  little  silence,  Augustin  the  bishop  said 
again  : 

**  '  So  he  will  remain  a  priest  till  it  shall  please 
God  for  him  to  be  a  bishop.  But  with  the  aid  and 
mercy  of  Christ,  I  shall  do  in  future  what  up  to  now 
I  have  not  been  able  to  do.  .  .  .  You  will  remember 
what  I  wanted  to  do  some  years  ago,  and  you  have 
not  allowed  me.  For  a  work  upon  the  Holy  Scrip- 
tures, with  which  my  brothers  and  my  fathers  the 
bishops  had  deigned  to  charge  me  in  the  two 
Councils  of  Numidia  and  Carthage,  /  was  not  to  be 
disturbed  by  anybody  during  five  days  of  the  week. 
That  was  a  thing  agreed  upon  between  you  and  me. 
The  act  was  drawn  up,  and  you  all  approved  of  it 
after  hearing  it  read.  But  your  promise  did  not 
last  long.  I  was  soon  encroached  upon  and  over- 
run by  you  all.  I  am  no  longer  free  to  study  as  I 
desire.  Morning  and  afternoon,  I  am  entangled  in 
your  worldly  a:fi[airs.  I  beg  of  you  and  supplicate 
you  in  Christ's  name  to  suffer  me  to  shift  the  burthen 
of  all  these  cares  upon  this  young  man,  the  priest 


THE   BARBARIAN   DESOLATION       363 

Heraclius,  whom  I  signal,  in  His  name,  as  my  suc- 
cessor in  the  bishopric' 

"  Upon  this  the  people  cried  out  six-and-twenty 
times  : 

"  '  We  thank  thee  for  thy  choice  !  ' 

"  And  the  people  having  become  silent,  Augustin 
the  bishop  said  : 

"  '  1  thank  you  for  your  charity  and  goodwill, 
or  rather,  I  thank  God  for  them.  So,  my  brothers, 
you  will  address  yourselves  to  Heraclius  upon  all 
the  points  you  are  used  to  submit  to  me.  Whenever 
he  needs  counsel,  my  care  and  my  help  will  not  be 
wanting.  ...  In  this  way,  without  any  loss  to  you, 
I  shall  be  able  to  devote  the  remainder  of  life  which 
it  may  please  God  still  to  leave  me,  not  to  laziness 
and  rest,  but  to  the  study  of  the  Holy  Scriptures. 
This  work  will  be  useful  to  Heraclius,  and  hence  to 
yourselves.  Let  nobody  then  envy  my  leisure,  for 
this  leisure  will  be  very  busy.  .  .  . 

"  '  It  only  remains  for  me  to  ask  you,  at  least 
those  who  can,  to  sign  these  acts.  Your  agreement 
I  cannot  do  without  ;  so  kindly  let  me  learn  it  by 
your  voices.' 

**  At  these  words  the  people  shouted  :    • 

"  *  Let  it  be  so  !    Let  it  be  so  !  ' 

"  When  all  there  became  silent,  Augustin  the 
bishop  made  an  end,  saying  : 

"  '  It  is  well.  Now  let  us  fulfil  our  duty  to  God. 
While  we  offer  Him  the  Sacrifice,  and  during  this 
hour  of  supplication,  I  would  urge  of  your  charity 
to  lay  aside  all  business  and  personal  cares,  and  to 
pray  the  Lord  God  for  this  church,  for  me,  and  for 
the  priest  Heraclius.'  " 


364  SAINT   AUGUSTIN 

The  dryness  and  official  wording  of  the  document 
do  not  succeed  in  stifling  the  vividness  and  colour 
of  this  crowded  scene.  Through  the  piety  of  the 
formal  cries,  it  is  easy  to  see  that  Augustin's  hearers 
were  hard  to  manage.  This  flock,  which  he  loved 
and  scolded  so  much,  was  no  easier  to  lead  now  than 
when  he  first  became  bishop.  Truh^  it  was  no 
sinecure  to  rule  and  administrate  the  diocese  of 
Hippo  !  The  bishop  was  literally  the  servant  of 
the  faithful.  Not  only  had  he  to  feed  and  clothe 
them,  to  spend  his  time  over  their  business  and 
quarrels  and  lawsuits,  but  he  belonged  to  them 
body  and  soul.  They  kept  a  jealous  eye  on  the 
employment  of  his  time  ;  if  he  went  away,  they 
asked  for  an  explanation.  Whenever  Augustin 
went  to  preach  at  Carthage  or  Utica,  he  apologized 
to  his  ow^n  people.  And  before  he  can  undertake 
a  commentary  on  the  Scriptures,  a  commentary, 
moreover,  which  he  has  been  asked  by  two  Councils 
to  prepare,  he  must  get  their  permission,  or,  at  any 
rate,  their  agreement. 

At  last,  at  seventy-two  j^ears  old,  after  he  had 
been  a  bishop  for  thirty-one  years,  he  got  their 
leave  to  take  a  little  rest.  But  what  a  rest  !  He 
himself  said  :  "  This  leisure  will  be  very  busy  " — 
this  leisure  which  is  going  to  fill  the  five  holidays  in 
the  week.  He  intends  to  study  and  fathom  the 
Scripture,  and  this,  besides,  to  the  profit  of  his 
people  and  clerg\^  and  the  whole  Church.  It  is  the 
fondest  dream  of  his  life — the  plan  he  was  never 
able  to  realize.  All  that,  at  first  sight,  astonishes  us. 
We  ask  ourselves,  "  What  else  had  he  been  doing 
up  to  this  time  in  his  treatises  and  letters  and 
sermons,  in  all  that  sea  of  words  and  writings  which 


THE   BARBARIAN   DESOLATION       365 

his  enemies  threw  up  at  him,  if  he  was  not  studying 
and  explaining  the  Holy  Scriptures  ?  "  The  fact  is, 
that  in  most  of  these  writings  and  sermons  he 
elucidates  the  truth  only  in  part,  or  else  he  is  con- 
futing heresiarchs.  What  he  wanted  to  do  was 
to  study  the  truth  for  its  own  sake,  without  having 
to  think  of  and  be  hindered  by  the  exposure  of  \ 
errors  ;  and  above  all,  to  seize  it  in  all  its  breadth 
and  all  its  depths,  to  have  done  with  this  blighting 
and  irritating  eristic,  and  to  reflect  in  a  vast  Mirror 
the  whole  and  purest  light  of  the  sacred  dogmas. 

He  never  found  the  time  for  it.  He  had  to  limit 
himself  to  a  handbook  of  practical  morals,  published 
under  this  title  before  his  death,  and  now  lost. 
Once  more  the  heresiarchs  prevented  him  from 
leading  a  life  of  speculation.  During  his  last  years, 
amid  the  cruellest  anxieties,  he  had  to  battle  with 
the  enemies  of  Grace  and  the  enemies  of  the  Trinity, 
with  Arius  and  Pelagius.  Pelagius  had  found  an  able 
disciple  in  a  young  Italian  bishop,  Julian  of  Ecla- 
num,  who  was  a  formidable  opponent  to  the  aged 
Augustin.  As  for  Arianism,  which  had  seemed 
extinguished  in  the  West,  here  it  was  given  a  new 
life  by  the  Barbarian  invasion. 

It  was  a  grave  moment  for  Catholicism,  as  it  was 
for  the  Empire.  The  Goths,  the  Alani,  and  the 
Vandals,  after  having  laid  waste  Gaul  and  Spain, 
were  taking  measures  to  pass  over  into  Africa. 
Should  they  renew  the  attempts  of  Alaric  and 
Radagaisus  against  Italy,  they  would  soon  be 
masters  of  the  entire  Occident.  Now  these  Bar- 
barians were  Arians.  Supposing  (and  it  seemed 
more  and  more  likely)  that  Africa  and  Italy  were 
vanquished  after  Gaul  and  Spain,  then  it  was  all 


366  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

over  with  Western  Catholicism.  For  the  invaders 
carried  their  rehgion  in  their  baggage,  and  forced 
it  on  the  conquered.  Augustin,  who  had  cherished 
the  hope  of  equalhng  the  earthly  kingdom  of  Christ 
to  that  of  the  Csesars,  was  going  to  see  the  ruin  of 
both.  His  terrified  imagination  exaggerated  still  more 
the  only  too  real  and  threatening  peril.  He  must 
have  lived  hours  of  agony,  expecting  a  disaster. 

If  only  the  truth  might  be  saved,  might  swim 
in  this  sea  of  errors  which  spread  like  a  flood  in  the 
wake  of  the  Barbarian  onflow  !  It  was  from  this 
wish,  no  doubt,  that  sprang  the  tireless  persistence 
which  the  old  bishop  put  into  a  last  battle  with 
heresy.  If  he  selected  Pelagius  specially  to  fall  upon 
with  fury,  if  he  forced  his  principles  to  their  last 
consequences  in  his  theory  of  Grace,  the  dread  of 
the  Barbarian  peril  had  perhaps  something  to  do 
with  it.  This  soul,  so  mild,  so  moderate,  so  tenderly 
human,  promulgated  a  pitiless  doctrine  which  does 
not  agree  with  his  character.  But  he  reasoned,  no 
doubt,  that  it  was  impossible  to  drive  home  too  hard 
the  need  of  the  Redemption  and  the  divinity  of  the 
Redeemer  in  front  of  these  Arians,  these  Pelagians, 
these  enemies  of  Christ,  who  to-morrow  perhaps 
would  be  masters  of  the  Empire. 

Therefore,  Augustin  continued  to  write,  and  dis- 
cuss, and  disprove.  There  came  a  time  when  he 
had  to  think  of  fighting  otherwise  than  with  the  pen. 
His  life,  the  lives  of  his  flock,  were  threatened.  He 
had  to  see  to  the  bodily  defence  of  his  country  and 
city.  The  fact  was,  that  some  time  before  the  great 
drive  of  the  Vandals,  forerunners  of  them,  in  the 
shape  of  hordes  of  African  Barbarians,  had  begun 
to  lay  waste  the  provinces.    The  Circoncelliones  were 


THE   BARBARIAN   DESOLATION       367 

not  dead,  nor  their  good  friends  the  Donatists 
either.  These  sectaries,  encouraged  by  the  wide- 
spread anarchy,  came  out  of  their  hiding-places  and 
shewed  themselves  more  insolent  and  aggressive 
than  ever.  Possibly  they  hoped  for  some  effective 
support  against  the  Roman  Church  from  the  Arian 
Vandals  who  were  drawing  near,  or  at  least  a  recog- 
nition of  what  they  believed  to  be  their  rights. 
Day  after  day,  bands  of  Barbarians  were  landing 
from  Spain.  In  the  rear  of  these  wandering  troops 
of  brigands  or  irregular  soldiers,  the  old  enemies  of 
the  Roman  peace  and  civilization,  the  Nomads  of 
the  South,  the  Moors  of  the  Atlas,  the  Kabylian 
mountaineers,  flung  themselves  upon  country  and 
town,  pillaging,  killing,  and  burning  everything  that 
got  in  their  way.  All  was  laid  desolate.  "  Countries 
but  lately  prosperous  and  populated  have  been 
changed  into  solitudes,"  said  Augustin. 

At  last,  in  the  spring  of  the  year  429,  the  Vandals 
and  the  Alani,  having  joined  forces  on  the  Spanish 
coast  under  their  King,  Genseric,  crossed  the  Straits 
of  Gibraltar.  It  was  devastation  on  a  large  scale 
this  time.  An  army  of  eighty  thousand  men  set 
themselves  methodically  to  plunder  the  African 
provinces.  Cherchell,  which  had  already  been 
sorely  tried  during  the  revolt  of  Firmus  the  Moor, 
was  captured  again  and  burned.  All  the  towns 
and  fortified  places  on  the  coast  fell,  one  after 
another.  Constantine  alone,  from  the  height  of  its 
rock,  kept  the  invaders  at  ba3^  To  starve  out  those 
who  fled  from  towns  and  farms  and  took  refuge  in 
the  fastnesses  of  the  Atlas,  the  Barbarians  destroyed 
the  harvest,  burned  the  grain-houses,  and  cut  down 
the  vines  and  fruit  trees.     And  they  set  fire  to  the 


368  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

forests  which  covered  the  slopes  of  the  mountains, 
to  force  the  refugees  out  of  their  hiding-places. 

This  stupid  ravaging  was  against  the  interest  of 
the  Vandals  themselves,  because  they  were  in- 
juring the  natural  riches  of  Africa,  the  report  of 
which  had  brought  them  there.  Africa  was  for 
them  the  land  of  plent}^  where  people  could  drink 
more  wine  than  they  wanted  and  eat  wheaten 
bread.  It  was  the  country  where  life  was  comfort- 
able, easy,  and  happy.  It  was  the  granar}^  of  the 
Mediterranean,  the  great  supply-store  of  Rome. 
But  their  senseless  craving  for  gold  led  them  to 
ruin  provinces,  in  which,  nevertheless,  they  counted 
upon  settling.  They  behaved  in  Africa  as  they  had 
behaved  in  Rome  under  Alaric.  By  way  of  tearing 
gold  out  of  the  inhabitants,  they  tortured  them  as 
they  had  tortured  the  wealthy  Romans.  They 
invented  worse  ones.  Children,  before  their  parents' 
eyes,  were  sliced  in  two  like  animals  in  a  slaughter- 
house. Or  else  their  skulls  were  smashed  against 
the  pavements  and  walls  of  houses. 

The  Church  was  believed  to  be  very  rich  ;  and 
perhaps,  as  it  had  managed  to  comprise  in  its 
domains  the  greatest  part  of  the  landed  estates,  it 
was  upon  it  chiefly  that  the  Barbarians  flung  them- 
selves. The  priests  and  bishops  were  tortured  with 
unheard-of  improvements  of  cruelty.  They  were 
dragged  in  the  rear  of  the  army  like  slaves,  so  that 
heavy  ransoms  might  be  extracted  from  the  faithful 
in  exchange  for  their  pastors.  They  were  obliged 
to  carry  the  baggage  like  the  camels  and  mules,  and 
when  they  gave  out  the  Barbarians  prodded  them 
with  lances.  Many  sank  down  beside  the  road  and 
never  rose  more.     But  it  is  certain  that  fanaticism 


THE   BARBARIAN   DESOLATION       369 

added  to  the  covetousness  and  ferocity  of  the 
Vandals.  These  Arians  bore  a  special  grudge  against 
Catholicism,  which  was,  besides,  in  their  eyes,  the 
religion  of  the  Roman  domination.  This  is  why 
they  made  their  chief  attacks  on  basilicas,  convents, 
hospitals,  and  all  the  property  of  the  Church. 
And  throughout  the  country  public  worship  was 
stopped. 

In  Hippo,  these  atrocities  were  known  before  the 
Barbarians  arrived.  The  people  must  have  awaited 
them  and  prepared  to  receive  them  with  gloomy 
resignation.  Africa  had  not  been  tranquil  for  a 
centur}^  After  the  risings  of  Firmus  and  Gildo, 
came  the  lootings  of  the  southern  Nomads  and  the 
Berber  mountaineers.  And  it  was  not  so  long  since 
the  Circoncelliones  were  keeping  people  constantl}^ 
on  the  alert.  But  this  time  everybody  felt  that  the 
great  ruin  was  at  hand.  They  were  stunned  by 
the  news  that  some  town  or  fortified  place  had 
been  captured  by  the  Vandals,  or  that  some  farm 
or  villa  in  the  neighbourhood  was  on  fire. 

Amid  the  general  dismay,  Augustin  did  his  best 
to  keep  calm.  He,  indeed,  saw  beyond  the  material 
destruction,  and  at  every  new  rumour  of  massacre 
or  burning  he  would  repeat  to  his  clerics  and  people 
the  words  of  the  Wise  Man  : 

"  Doth  the  firm  of  heart  grieve  to  see  fall  the 
stones  and  beams,  and  death  seize  the  children  of 
men  ? 

They  accused  him  of  being  callous.  They  did  not 
understand  him.  While  all  about  him  mourned  the 
present  misfortunes,  he  was  already  lamenting  over 
the  evil  to  come,  and  this  clear-sightedness  pained 
him  more  than  the  shock  of  the  daily  horrors  com- 


370  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

mitted  by  the  Barbarians.  His  disciple  Possidius, 
the  Bishop  of  Guelma,  who  was  with  him  in  these 
sad  days,  naively  applied  to  him  the  saying  out  of 
Ecclesiastes  :  "In  much  wisdom  is  much  grief." 
Augustin  did  really  suffer  more  than  others,  because 
he  thought  more  profoundly  on  the  disaster.  He 
foresaw  that  Africa  was  going  to  be  lost  to  the 
Empire,  and  consequently  to  the  Church.  They 
were  bound  together  in  his  mind.  What  was  there 
to  do  against  brutal  strength  ?  All  the  eloquence 
and  all  the  charity  in  the  world  would  be  as  nothing 
against  that  unchained  elemental  mass  of  Vandals. 
It  was  as  impossible  to  convert  the  Barbarians  as  it 
had  been  to  convert  the  Donatists.  Force  was  the 
only  resource  against  force. 

Then  in  despair  the  man  of  God  turned  once 
more  to  Csesar.  The  monk  appealed  to  the  soldier. 
He  charged  Boniface,  Count  of  Africa,  to  save  Rome 
and  the  Church. 

This  Boniface,  a  rather  ambiguous  personage,  was 
a  fine  type  of  the  swashbuckler  and  official  of  the 
Lower-Empire.  Thracian  by  origin,  he  joined  the 
trickery  of  the  Oriental  to  all  the  vices  of  the  Bar- 
barian. He  was  strong,  clever  in  all  bodil}^  exer- 
cises like  the  soldiers  of  those  days,  overflowing 
with  vigour  and  health,  and  even  brave  at  times. 
In  addition,  he  was  fond  of  wine  and  women,  and 
ate  and  drank  like  a  true  pagan.  He  was  married 
twice,  and  after  his  second  marriage  he  kept  in  the 
sight  and  knowledge  of  everybody  a  harem  of  con- 
cubines. He  was  sent,  first  of  all,  to  Africa  as  a 
Tribune — that  is  to  say,  as  Commissioner  of  the 
Imperial  Government,  probably  to  carry  out  the 
decrees  of  Honorius  against  the  Donatists  ;   and  ere 


THE   BARBARIAN    DESOLATION       371 

long  he  was  made  commander  of  the  mihtary  forces 
of  the  province,  with  the  title  of  Count. 

In  reality,  while  seeming  to  protect  the  country, 
he  set  himself  to  plunder  it,  as  the  tradition  was 
among  the  Roman  officials.  His  offlcium,  still  more 
grasping  than  himself,  persuaded  him  to  deeds 
which  the  Bishop  of  Hippo,  who  was,  however, 
anxious  to  remain  on  the  right  side  of  him,  pro- 
tested against  by  hints.  Boniface  was  obliged  to 
overlook  much  robbery  and  pillage  on  the  part  of 
his  subordinates  so  as  to  keep  them  faithful.  More- 
over, he  himself  stole.  He  was  bound  to  close  his 
eyes  to  the  depredations  of  others,  that  his  own 
might  be  winked  at.  Once  become  the  accom- 
plice of  this  band  of  robbers,  he  had  no  longer  the 
authority  to  control  them. 

How  did  Augustin  ever  believe  in  the  good- 
will and  good  faith  of  this  adventurer  full  of  coarse 
passions,  so  far  as  to  put  his  final  hopes  in  him  ? 
Augustin  knew  men  very  well ;  he  could  detect  low 
and  hypocritical  natures  at  a  distance.  How  came 
it  that  he  was  taken  in  by  Boniface  ? 

Well,  Augustin  wanted  his  support,  first  of  all, 
when  he  came  as  Imperial  Commissioner  to  Carthage 
to  bring  the  Donatists  into  line.  Generally,  we 
see  only  the  good  points  of  people  who  do  us  good 
turns.  Besides,  in  order  to  propitiate  the  bishop, 
and  the  devout  Court  at  Ravenna,  the  Tribune 
advertised  his  great  zeal  in  favour  of  Catholicism. 
His  first  wife,  a  very  pious  woman  whom  he  seems 
to  have  loved  much,  encouraged  him  in  this.  When 
she  died,  he  was  so  overcome  by  despair  that  he  took 
refuge  in  the  extremest  practices  of  religion — and 
in  this,  perhaps,  he  was  quite  sincere.     It  is  also 


372  SAINT   AUGUSTIN 

possible  that  he  was  becoming  discredited  at  Ra- 
venna, where  they  must  have  known  about  his 
oppressions  and  suspected  his  ambitious  intrigues. 
An^^how,  whether  he  was  really  disgusted  with  the 
world,  or  whether  he  deemed  it  prudent  to  throw 
a  little  oblivion  over  himself  just  then,  he  spoke  on 
all  hands  of  resigning  his  post  and  living  in  retreat 
like  a  monk.  It  was  just  at  this  moment  that 
Augustin  and  Alypius  begged  him  not  to  desert  the 
African  army. 

They  met  the  Commander-in-Chief  at  Thubunae,  in 
Southern  Numidia,  where,  no  doubt,  he  was  reducing 
the  Nomads.  We  must  remark  once  more  Augustin's 
energy  in  travelling,  to  the  very  eve  of  his  death.  It 
was  a  long  and  dangerous  road  from  Hippo  to  Thu- 
bunae. Before  making  up  his  mind  to  so  much 
fatigue,  the  old  bishop  must  have  judged  the  situa- 
tion to  be  very  serious.  At  Thubunae,  was  Boni- 
face playing  a  game,  or  was  he,  indeed,  so  crushed 
by  his  grief  that  the  world  had  become  unbear- 
able and  he  pondered  genuine  thoughts  of  changing 
his  way  of  life  ?  What  is  sure  is,  that  he  gave  the 
two  prelates  the  most  edifying  talk.  When  they 
heard  the  Count  of  Africa  speaking  with  unction  of 
the  cloister  and  of  his  desire  to  retire  there,  they 
were  a  little  astonished  at  so  much  piety  in  a  soldier. 
Besides,  these  excellent  resolutions  were  most  in- 
convenient for  their  plans.  They  remonstrated 
with  him  that  it  was  quite  possible  to  save  one's 
soul  in  the  army,  and  quoted  the  example  of  David, 
the  warrior  king.  They  ended  by  telling  him  all  the 
expectations  they  founded  upon  his  resource  and 
firmness.  They  begged  him  to  protect  the  churches 
and  convents  against  fresh  attacks  of  the  Donatists, 


THE   BARBARIAN   DESOLATION       373 

and  especially  against  the  Barbarians  of  Africa. 
These  were  at  this  moment  breaking  down  all  the 
old  defence  lines  and  laying  waste  the  territories  of 
the  Empire. 

Boniface  allowed  himself  to  be  easily  convinced — 
promised  whatever  he  was  asked.  But  he  never 
budged.  From  now  on,  his  conduct  becomes  most 
singular.  He  is  in  command  of  all  the  military 
strength  of  the  province,  and  he  takes  no  steps  to 
suppress  the  African  looters.  It  would  seem  as  if 
he  only  thought  of  filling  the  coffers  of  himself  and 
his  friends.  The  countr}/  was  so  systematically 
scoured  by  them  that,  as  Augustin  said,  there  was 
nothing  more  left  to  take. 

This  inactivity  lent  colour  to  the  rumours  of 
treason.  Nor  is  it  impossible  that  he  had  cherished 
a  plan  from  the  beginning  of  his  command  to  cut 
out  an  independent  principality  for  himself  in 
Africa.  Was  this  the  reason  that  he  dealt  softly 
with  the  native  tribes,  so  as  to  make  certain  of  their 
help  in  case  of  a  conflict  with  the  Imperial  army  ? 
However  that  may  be,  his  behaviour  was  not 
frank.  Some  years  later,  he  landed  on  the 
Spanish  coast  to  war  against  the  Vandals  under  the 
command  of  the  Prefect  Castinus,  and  there  he 
married  a  Barbarian  princess  who  was  by  religion 
an  Arian.  It  is  true  that  the  new  Countess  of 
Africa  became  a  convert  to  Catholicism.  But  her 
first  child  was  baptized  by  Arian  priests,  who  re- 
baptized,  at  the  same  time,  the  Catholic  slaves  of 
Boniface's  household.  This  marriage  with  a  Vandal, 
these  concessions  to  Arianism,  gave  immense  scandal 
to  the  orthodox.  Rumours  of  treason  began  to 
float  about  again. 


374  SAINT   AUGUSTIN 

No  doubt  Boniface  took  great  advantage  of  his 
fidelity  to  the  Empress  Placidia.  But  he  was  stand- 
ing between  the  all-powerful  Barbarians  and  the 
undermined  Empire.  He  wanted  to  remain  on  good 
terms  with  both,  and  then,  when  the  hour  came,  to 
go  over  to  the  stronger.  This  double-faced  diplo- 
macy caused  his  downfall.  His  rival  Aetius  accused 
him  of  high  treason  before  Placidia.  The  Court  of 
Ravenna  declared  him  an  enemy  of  the  Empire, 
and  an  army  was  sent  against  him.  Boniface  did 
not  hesitate  ;  he  went  into  open  rebellion  against 
Rome. 

Augustin  was  thunderstruck  by  his  desertion. 
But  what  way  was  there  to  make  this  violent  man 
listen  to  reason,  who  had  at  least  the  appearances 
of  right  on  his  side,  since  there  was  a  chance  they 
had  slandered  him  to  the  Empress,  and  who  thought 
it  quite  natural  to  take  vengeance  on  his  enemies  ? 
His  recent  successes  had  still  more  intoxicated  him. 
He  had  just  defeated  the  two  generals  who  had 
been  sent  to  reduce  him,  and  he  was  accordingly 
master  of  the  situation  in  Africa.  What  was  he 
going  to  do  ?  The  worst  resolutions  were  to  be 
feared  from  this  conqueror,  all  smarting,  and 
hungry  for  revenge.  .  .  .  Nevertheless,  Augustin 
resolved  to  write  to  him.  His  letter  is  a  master- 
piece of  tact,  of  prudence,  and  also  of  Christian  and 
episcopal  firmness. 

It  would  have  been  dangerous  to  declare  to  this 
triumphant  rebel :  "  You  are  in  the  wrong.  Your 
duty  is  to  submit  to  the  Emperor,  your  master." 
Boniface  was  quite  capable  of  answering  :  "  What 
are  you  interfering  for  ?  Politics  are  no  business  of 
yours.     Look  after  your  Church  !  "     This  is  why 


THE   BARBARIAN   DESOLATION       375 

Augustin  very  cleverly  speaks  to  him  from  be- 
ginning to  end  of  his  letter  simply  as  a  bishop, 
eager  for  the  salvation  of  a  very  dear  son  in  Jesus 
Christ.  And  so,  by  keeping  strictly  to  his  office  of 
spiritual  director,  he  gained  his  end  more  surely 
and  entirely  ;  and,  as  a  doctor  of  souls,  he  ventured 
to  remind  Boniface  of  certain  truths  which  he 
would  never  have  dared  to  mention  as  counsellor. 

According  to  Augustin,  the  disgrace  of  the  Count, 
and  the  evils  which  this  event  had  brought  on 
Africa,  came  principally  from  his  attachment  to 
worldly  benefits.  It  was  the  ambition  and  covetous- 
ness  of  himself  and  his  followers  which  had  done  all 
the  harm.  Let  him  free  himself  from  perishable 
things,  let  him  prevent  the  thefts  and  plundering 
of  those  under  him.  Let  him,  who  some  time  ago 
wished  to  live  in  perfect  celibacy,  now  keep  at 
least  to  his  wife  and  no  other.  Finally,  let  him 
remember  his  sworn  allegiance.  Augustin  did  not 
mean  to  go  into  the  quarrel  between  Boniface  and 
Placidia,  and  he  gave  no  opinion  as  to  the  grievances 
of  either.  He  confined  himself  to  saying  to  the 
general  in  rebellion  :  "If  you  have  received  so 
many  benefits  from  the  Roman  Empire,  do  not 
render  evil  for  good.  If,  on  the  other  hand,  you 
have  received  evil,  do  not  render  evil  for  evil." 

It  is  clear  that  the  Bishop  of  Hippo  could  scarcely 
have  given  any  other  advice  to  the  Count  of  Africa. 
To  play  the  part  of  political  counsellor  in  the  very 
entangled  state  of  affairs  was  extremely  risky. 
How  was  it  possible  to  exhort  a  victorious  general 
to  lay  down  his  arms  before  the  conquered  ?  And 
yet,  in  estimating  the  situation  from  the  Christian 
standpoint  alone,  Augustin  had  found  a  way  to  say 


376  SAINT   AUGUSTIN 

ever3^thing  essential,  all  that  could  profitably  be 
said  at  the  moment. 

How  did  Boniface  take  a  letter  which  was,  in  the 
circumstances,  so  courageous  ?  What  we  know  is 
that  he  did  not  alter  his  plans.  It  would  indeed 
have  been  very  difficult  for  him  to  withdraw  and 
yield  ;  and  more  than  ever  since  a  new  army  under 
Sigisvultus  had  been  sent  against  him  in  all  haste. 
A  real  fatality  compelled  him  to  remain  in  revolt 
against  Rome.  Did  he  believe  he  was  ruined,  as 
has  been  stated,  or  else,  through  his  family  con- 
nections— let  us  remember  that  his  wife  was  a  Bar- 
barian— had  he  been  for  a  long  time  plotting  with 
Genseric  to  divide  Africa  ?  He  has  been  accused  of 
that.  What  comes  out  is,  that  as  soon  as  he  heard  of 
the  arrival  of  Sigisvultus  and  the  new  expeditionary 
force,  he  called  in  the  Vandals  to  his  aid.  This  was 
the  great  invasion  of  429. 

Ere  long,  the  Barbarians  entered  Numidia.  The 
borderlands  about  Hippo  were  threatened.  Stricken 
with  terror,  the  inhabitants  in  a  mass  fled  before 
the  enemy,  leaving  the  towns  empty.  Those  who 
were  caught  in  them  rushed  into  the  churches,  im- 
ploring the  bishops  and  priests  to  help  them.  Or 
else,  giving  up  all  hope  of  life,  they  cried  out  to  be 
baptized,  confessed,  did  penance  in  public.  The 
Vandals,  as  we  have  seen,  aimed  specially  at  the 
clergy  ;  they  believed  that  the  Catholic  priests  were 
the  soul  of  the  resistance.  Should  not  these  priests, 
then,  in  the  very  interest  of  the  Church,  save  them- 
selves for  quieter  times,  and  escape  the  persecution 
by  flight  ?  Many  sheltered  themselves  behind  the 
words  of  Christ  :  "  When  they  persecute  you  in  this 
city,  flee  ye  into  another." 


THE   BARBARIAN   DESOLATION       377 

But  Augustin  strongly  condemned  the  cowardli- 
ness of  the  deserters.  In  a  letter  addressed  to  his 
fellow-bishop,  Honoratus,  and  intended  to  be  read 
by  all  the  clergy  in  Africa,  he  declares  that  bishops 
and  priests  should  not  abandon  their  churches  and 
dioceses,  but  stay  at  their  post  till  the  end — till 
death  and  till  martyrdom — to  fulfil  the  duties  of 
their  ministry.  If  the  faithful  were  able  to  withdraw 
into  a  safe  place,  their  pastors  might  accompany  them; 
if  not,  they  should  die  in  the  midst  of  them.  Thus  they 
would  have  at  least  the  consolation  of  lending  aid 
to  the  dying  in  their  last  moments,  and  especially 
of  preventing  the  apostasies  which  readily  took 
place  under  the  shock  of  the  terror.  For  Augustin, 
who  foresaw  the  future,  the  essential  thing  was  that 
later,  when  the  Vandal  wave  had  swept  away, 
Catholicism  might  flourish  again  in  Africa,  To  this 
end,  the  Catholics  must  be  made  to  remain  in  the 
country,  and  the  greatest  possible  number  be 
strengthened  in  their  faith.  Otherwise,  the  work  of 
three  centuries  would  have  to  be  done  all  over 
again. 

We  must  admire  this  courage  and  clear-minded- 
ness  in  an  old  man  of  seventy-live,  who  was  being 
continually  harassed  by  the  complaints  and  lamenta- 
tions of  a  crowd  of  demoralized  fugitives.  The 
position  became  more  and  more  critical.  The  siege 
lines  were  drawing  closer.  But  in  the  midst  of  all 
this  dread,  Augustin  was  given  a  gleam  of  hope  : 
Boniface  made  his  peace  with  the  Empire.  Hence- 
forward, his  army,  turning  against  the  Barbarians, 
might  protect  Hippo  and  perhaps  save  Africa. 

Had  Augustin  a  hand  in  this  reconciliation  ? 
There  is  not  the  least  doubt  that  he  desired  it  most 


37Bf^  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

earnestly.  In  a  letter  to  Count  Darius,  the  special 
envoy  sent  from  Ravenna  to  treat  with  the  rebel 
general,  he  warmly  congratulates  the  Imperial 
plenipotentiary  on  his  mission  of  peace.  "  You 
are  sent,"  he  said  to  him,  "  to  stop  the  shedding  of 
blood.  Therefore  rejoice,  illustrious  and  very  dear 
son  in  Jesus  Christ,  rejoice  in  this  great  and  real 
blessing,  and  rejoice  upon  it  in  the  Lord,  Who  has 
made  you  what  you  are,  and  entrusted  to  you  a 
task  so  beautiful  and  important.  May  God  seal  the 
good  work  He  has  done  for  us  through  you  !  "  .  .  . 
And  Darius  answered  :  ''  May  you  be  spared  to 
pray  such  prayers  for  the  Empire  and  the  Roman 
State  a  long  time  yet,  my  Father." 

But  the  Empire  was  lost  in  Africa.  If  the  recon- 
ciliation of  the  rebellious  Count  had  given  some 
illusions  to  Augustin,  they  did  not  last  long.  Boni- 
face, having  failed  in  his  endeavours  to  negotiate 
the  retreat  of  the  Vandals,  was  defeated  by  Genseric, 
and  obhged  to  fall  back  into  Hippo  with  an  army 
of  mercenary  Goths.  Thus  it  came  about  that 
Barbarians  held  against  other  Barbarians  one  of 
the  last  Roman  citadels  in  Africa.  From  the  end 
of  May,  430,  Hippo  was  blockaded  on  the  land  side 
and  on  the  side  of  the  sea. 

In  great  tribulation,  Augustin  resigned  himself 
to  this  supreme  humiliation,  and  to  all  the  horrors 
which  would  have  to  be  endured  if  the  city  were 
captured.  As  a  Christian,  he  left  all  to  the  will  of 
God,  and  he  would  repeat  to  those  about  him  the 
words  of  the  Psalm  :  "  Righteous  art  Thou,  O  Lord, 
and  upright  are  Thy  judgments."  A  number  of 
fugitive  priests,  and  among  them  Possidius,  Bishop 
of  Guelma,  had  taken  refuge  in  the  episcopal  resi- 


THE   BARBARIAN   DESOLATION       379 

dence.  One  day,  when  he  lost  heart,  Augustin, 
who  was  at  table  with  them,  said  : 

"  In  front  of  all  these  disasters,  I  ask  God  to 
deliver  this  city  from  the  siege,  or,  if  that  be  not 
His  decree,  to  give  His  servants  the  necessary 
strength  to  do  His  will,  or  at  least  to  take  me  from 
this  world  and  receive  me  into  His  bosom." 

But  it  is  more  than  probable  that  discouragement 
of  that  kind  was  only  momentary  with  him,  and  that 
in  his  sermons,  as  well  as  in  his  conversations  with 
Boniface,  he  did  his  utmost  to  stimulate  the  courage 
of  the  people  and  the  general.  His  correspondence 
includes  a  series  of  letters  written  about  this  time 
to  the  Count  of  Africa,  which  manifest  here  and  there 
a  very  warlike  spirit.  These  letters  are  most  cer- 
tainly apocryphal.  Yet  they  do  reveal  something  of 
what  must  have  been  the  sentiments  just  then  of  the 
people  of  Hippo  and  of  Augustin  himself.  One  of 
these  letters  emphatically  congratulates  Boniface 
upon  an  advantage  gained  over  the  Barbarians. 

"  Your  Excellency  knows,  I  believe,  that  I  am 
stretched  upon  my  bed,  and  that  I  long  for  my  last 
day  to  come.  I  am  overjoyed  at  your  victory.  I 
urge  you  to  save  the  Roman  city.  Rule  your  soldiers 
like  a  good  Count.  Do  not  trust  too  much  to  your 
own  strength.  Put  your  glory  in  Him  Who  gives 
courage,  and  you  will  never  fear  any  enemy. 
Farewell !  " 

The  words  do  not  matter  much.  Whatever  may 
have  been  Augustin's  last  farewell  to  the  defender 
of  Hippo,  it  was  no  doubt  couched  in  language  not 
unlike  this.  In  any  case,  posterity  has  wished  to 
believe  that  the  dying  bishop  maintained  to  the 
end  his  unyielding  demeanour  face  to  face  with  the 


38o  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

Barbarians.  It  would  be  a  misuse  of  words  to 
represent  him  as  a  patriot  in  the  present  sense  of 
the  term.  It  is  no  less  true  that  this  African,  this 
Christian,  was  an  admirable  servant  of  Rome. 
Until  his  death  he  kept  his  respect  for  it,  because 
in  his  eyes  the  Empire  meant  order,  peace,  civiliza- 
tion, the  unity  of  faith  in  the  unity  of  rule. 


IV 

SAINT   AUGUSTIN 

IN  the  third  month  of  the  siege,  he  fell  ill.  He 
had  a  fever — no  doubt  an  infectious  fever.  The 
country  people,  the  wounded  soldiers  who  had  taken 
refuge  in  Hippo  after  the  rout  of  Boniface,  must 
have  brought  in  the  germs  of  disease.  It  was,  more- 
over, the  end  of  August,  the  season  of  epidemics, 
of  damp  heats  and  oppressive  evenings,  the  time 
of  the  year  most  dangerous  and  trying  for  sick 
people. 

All  at  once,  Augustin  took  to  his  bed.  But  even 
there,  upon  the  bed  in  which  he  was  going  to  die, 
he  was  not  left  in  quiet.  People  came  to  ask  his 
prayers  for  some  possessed  by  devils.  The  old 
bishop  was  touched  ;  he  wept  and  asked  God  to 
give  him  this  grace,  and  the  devils  went  out  of  those 
poor  crazy  men.  This  cure,  as  may  well  be  thought, 
made  a  great  noise  in  the  city.  A  man  brought  him 
another  one  sick  to  be  healed.  Augustin,  being 
most  weary,  said  to  the  man  : 

"  My  son,  you  see  the  state  I  am  in.  If  I  had 
an}^  power  over  illnesses,  I  should  begin  by  curing 
myself." 

But  the  man  had  no  idea  of  being  put  off  :  he 
had  had  a  dream.  A  mysterious  voice  had  said  to 
him,  "  Go  and  see  Augustin  :  he  will  put  his  hands 
on  the  sick  person,  who  will  rise  up  cured."     And, 

381 


382  SAINT   AUGUSTIN 

in  fact,  he  did.  I  think  these  are  the  only  miracles 
the  saint  made  in  his  life.  But  what  matters  that, 
when  the  continual  miracle  of  his  charity  and  his 
apostolate  is  considered  ? 

Soon  the  bishop's  illness  grew  worse.  Eventually, 
he  succeeded  in  persuading  them  not  to  disturb  him 
any  more,  and  that  they  would  let  him  prepare  for 
death  in  silence  and  recollection.  During  the  ten 
days  that  he  still  lingered,  nobody  entered  his  cell 
save  the  physicians,  and  the  servants  who  brought 
him  a  little  food.  He  availed  himself  of  the  quiet  to 
repent  of  his  faults.  For  he  was  used  to  say  to  his 
clergy  that  "  even  after  baptism,  Christians — nay, 
priests,  however  holy  the}^  might  be,  ought  never  go 
out  of  life  without  having  made  a  general  confession." 
And  the  better  to  rouse  his  contrition,  he  had  desired 
them  to  copy  out  on  leaves  the  Penitential  Psalms, 
and  to  put  these  leaves  on  the  wall  of  his  room.  He 
read  them  continually  from  his  pillow. 

Here,  then,  he  is  alone  with  himself  and  God.  A 
solemn  moment  for  the  great  old  man  ! 

He  called  up  his  past  life,  and  what  struck  him 
most,  and  saddened  him,  was  the  foundering  of  all 
his  human  hopes.  The  enemies  of  the  Church, 
whom  he  had  battled  with  almost  without  ceasing 
for  forty  years,  and  had  reason  to  believe  con- 
quered— all  these  enemies  were  raising  their  heads  : 
Donatists,  Arians,  Barbarians.  With  the  Bar- 
barians' help,  the  Arians  were  going  to  be  the 
masters  of  Africa.  The  churches,  reformed  at  the 
price  of  such  long  efforts,  would  be  once  more 
destroyed.  And  see  now  !  the  authority  which 
might  have  supported  them,  which  he  had  perhaps 
too  much  relied  upon — well,  the  Empire  was  sink- 


SAINT   AUGUSTIN  383 

ing  too.  It  was  the  end  of  order,  of  substantial 
peace,  of  that  minimum  of  safety  which  is  indis- 
pensable for  all  spiritual  effort.  From  one  end  to  the 
other  of  the  Western  world.  Barbarism  triumphed. 

Sometimes,  amid  these  sad  thoughts  of  the  dying 
man,  the  clangour  of  clarions  blared  out — there 
was  a  call  to  arms  on  the  ramparts.  And  these 
musics  came  to  him  in  his  half-delirious  state  very 
mournfully,  like  the  trumpets  proclaiming  the  Judg- 
ment Day.  Yes,  it  might  well  be  feared  that  the 
Day  of  Wrath  was  here  !  Was  it  really  the  end  of 
the  world,  or  only  the  end  of  a  world  ?  .  .  .  Truly, 
there  were  then  enough  horrors  and  calamities  to 
make  people  think  of  the  morrow  with  dismay. 
Many  of  the  signs  predicted  b}/  Scripture  dazed 
the  imagination  :  desolations,  wars,  persecutions  of 
the  Church,  increased  with  terrific  steadiness  and 
cruelty.  Yet  all  the  signs  foretold  were  not  there. 
How  many  times  already  had  humanity  been 
deceived  in  its  fear  and  its  hope  !  In  realitj/, 
though  all  seemed  to  shew  that  the  end  of  time  was 
drawing  nigh,  no  one  could  tell  the  day  nor  the 
hour  of  the  Judgment.  Hence,  men  should  watch 
always,  according  to  the  words  of  Christ.  .  .  . 
But  if  this  trial  of  Barbarian  war  was  to  pass  like 
the  others,  how  woeful  it  was  while  it  endured  ! 
How  hard  for  Augustin,  above  all,  who  saw  nearly 
the  whole  of  his  work  thrown  down. 

One  thought  at  least  consoled  him,  that  since 
his  conversion,  for  forty  years  and  more,  he  had 
done  all  he  was  able — he  had  worked  for  Christ 
even  beyond  his  strength.  He  said  to  himself  that 
he  left  behind  him  the  fruit  of  a  huge  labour,  a 
whole  body  of  doctrine  and  apology  which  would 


384  SAINT   AUGUSTIN 

safeguard  against  error  whatever  was  left  of  his  flock 
and  of  the  African  Church.  He  himself  had  founded 
a  Church  which  might  serve  as  an  example,  his  dear 
Church  of  Hippo,  that  he  had  done  his  best  to  fashion 
after  the  divine  plan.  And  he  had  also  founded  con- 
vents, and  a  library  full  of  books,  which  had  become 
still  larger  recently  through  the  generosity  of  Count 
Darius.  He  had  lessoned  his  clergy  who,  once  the 
disasters  were  past,  would  scatter  the  good  seed  of 
Truth.  Books,  monasteries,  priests,  a  sure  and  solid 
nourishment  for  the  mind,  shelters  and  guides  for 
souls — there  is  what  he  bequeathed  to  the  workers 
of  the  future.  And  with  a  little  joy  minghng  with 
his  sorrow,  he  read  on  the  corner  of  the  wall  where 
his  bed  was,  this  verse  of  the  Psalm  :  Exihit  homo  ad 
opus  suuni  et  operationem  suam  usque  ad  vesperum — 
"  Man  goeth  forth  unto  his  work  and  to  his  labour 
until  the  evening."  He,  too,  had  worked  until 
evening. 

If  the  earthly  reward  seemed  to  slip  from  him 
now,  if  all  was  sinking  around  him,  if  his  episcopal 
city  was  beleaguered,  if  he  himself,  although  still 
a  strong  man — "  he  had  the  use  of  all  his  limbs," 
says  Possidius ;  "  a  keen  ear  and  perfect  sight  " — 
if  he  himself  was  dying  too  soon,  it  was  doubtless  in 
expiation  for  the  sins  of  his  youth.  At  this  remem- 
brance of  his  disorders,  the  tears  fell  over  his  face. 
.  .  .  And  yet,  however  wild  had  been  his  conduct 
at  that  time,  he  could  descry  in  it  the  sure  marks 
of  his  vocation.  He  recalled  the  despair  and  tears  of 
his  mother,  but  also  his  enthusiasm  when  he  read  the 
Hortensius  ;  his  disgust  for  the  world  and  all  things 
when  he  lost  his  friend.  In  the  old  man  he  recog- 
nized the  new.     And  he  said  to  himself :    "  Nay  ! 


SAINT   AUGUSTIN  385 

but  that  was  myself.  I  have  not  changed.  I  have 
only  found  myself.  I  have  only  changed  my  ways. 
In  my  youth,  in  the  strongest  time  of  my  mistakes, 
I  had  already  risen  to  turn  to  Thee,  my  God  !  " 

His  worst  foolishness  had  been  the  desire  to  under- 
stand all  things.  He  had  failed  in  humility  of  mind. 
Then  God  had  given  him  the  grace  to  submit  his 
intelligence  to  the  faith.  He  had  believed,  and  then 
he  had  understood,  as  well  as  he  could,  as  much  as 
he  could.  In  the  beginning,  he  acknowledged  very 
plainly  that  he  did  not  understand.  And  then  faith 
had  thrown  open  the  roads  of  understanding.  He 
had  splendidly  employed  his  reason,  within  the 
limits  laid  down  against  mortal  weakness.  Had  that 
not  been  the  proud  desire  of  his  youth  ?  To  under- 
stand !    What  greater  destiny  ? 

To  love  also.  After  he  had  freed  himself  from 
carnal  passions,  he  had  much  employed  his  heart. 
He  thought  of  all  the  charity  he  had  poured  out 
upon  his  people  and  the  Church,  upon  all  he  had 
loved  in  God — upon  all  he  had  done,  upon  all  the 
consequence  of  his  labour,  inspired  and  strengthened 
by  the  divine  love.  .  .  .  Yes,  to  love — all  was  in 
that  !  Let  the  Barbarians  come  !  Had  not  Christ 
said  :  "  Lo,  I  am  with  you  alway,  even  unto  the 
end  of  the  world  "  ?  So  long  as  there  shall  be  two 
men  gathered  together  for  love  of  Him,  the  world 
will  not  be  entirely  lost,  the  Church  and  civilization 
will  be  saved.  The  religion  of  Christ  is  a  leaven  of 
action,  understanding,  sacrifice,  and  charity.  If 
the  world  be  not  at  this  hour  already  condemned, 
if  the  Day  of  Judgment  be  still  far  off,  it  is  from  this 
religion  that  shall  arise  the  new  influences  of  the 
future.  .  .  . 


386  SAINT  AUGUSTIN 

And  so  Augustin  forgot  his  sufferings  and  his 
human  disappointments  in  the  thought  that,  in  spite 
of  all,  the  Church  is  eternal.  The  City  of  God 
gathered  in  the  wreckage  of  the  earthly  citj^  :  "  The 
Goth  cannot  capture  what  Christ  protects  " — Non 
tollit  Gothus  qiiod  custodit  Ckristus.  And  as  his 
sufferings  increased,  he  turned  all  his  thoughts  on 
this  unending  City,  "  where  we  rest,  where  we  see, 
where  we  love,"  where  we  find  again  all  the  beloved 
ones  who  have  gone  away.  All — he  called  them  all 
in  this  supreme  moment :  Monnica,  Adeodatus,  and 
her  who  had  nearty  lost  herself  for  him,  and  all  those 
he  had  held  dear.  .  .  . 

On  the  fifth  day  of  the  calends  of  September, 
Augustin,  the  bishop,  was  very  low.  They  were 
praying  for  him  in  the  churches  at  Hippo,  and 
especially  in  the  Basilica  of  Peace,  where  he  had 
preached  and  worked  for  others  so  long.  Possidius 
of  Guelma  was  in  the  bishop's  room,  and  the  priests 
and  monks.  The}^  sent  up  their  prayers  with  those 
of  the  dying  man.  And  no  doubt  they  sang  for  the 
last  time  before  him  one  of  those  liturgical  chants 
which  long  ago  at  Milan  had  touched  him  even  to 
tears,  and  now,  since  the  siege,  in  the  panic  caused 
by  the  Barbarians,  they  dared  not  sing  any  more. 
Augustin,  guarding  himself  even  now  against  the 
too  poignant  sweetness  of  the  melody,  attended 
only  to  the  sense  of  the  words.    And  he  said  : 

"  My  soul  thirsts  after  the  living  God.  When  shall 
I  appear  before  His  face  ?  " 

Or  again  : 

"  He  Who  is  Life  has  come  down  into  this  world. 
He  has  suffered  our  death,  and  He  has  caused  it  to 
die  by  the  fullness  of  His  life.  .  .  .  Life  has  come 


SAINT  AUGUSTIN  387 

down  to  you — and  will  you  not  ascend  towards  Him 
and  live  ?  .  .  ." 

He  was  passing  into  Life  and  into  Glory.  He  was 
going  very  quietly,  amid  the  chanting  of  hymns  and 
the  murmur  of  prayers.  .  .  .  Little  by  little  his 
eyes  were  veiled,  the  lines  of  his  face  became  rigid. 
His  lips  moved  no  more.  Possidius,  the  faithful 
disciple,  bent  over  him.  Like  a  patriarch  of  the 
Scriptures,  Augustin  of  Thagaste  "  slept  with  his 
fathers."  .  .  . 

And  now,  whatever  may  be  the  worth  of  this  book, 
which  has  been  planned  and  carried  out  in  a  spirit 
of  veneration  and  love  for  the  saint,  for  the  great 
heart  and  the  great  intellect  that  Augustin  was,  for 
this  unique  type  of  the  Christian,  the  most  perfect 
and  the  most  admirable  perhaps  that  has  ever  been 
seen — the  author  can  only  repeat  in  all  humility 
what  was  said  fifteen  hundred  years  ago  by  the 
Bishop  of  Guelma,  Augustin's  first  biographer  : 

"  I  do  desire  of  the  charity  of  those  into  whose 
hands  this  work  shall  fall,  to  join  with  me  in  thanks- 
giving and  blessing  to  Our  Lord,  Who  has  inspired 
me  to  make  known  this  life  to  those  present  and 
those  absent,  and  has  given  me  the  strength 
to  do  it.  Pray  for  me  and  with  me,  that  I  may  try 
here  below  to  follow  in  the  steps  of  this  peerless 
man,  whom,  by  God's  goodness,  I  have  had  the 
happiness  of  living  with  for  such  a  long  time.  ..." 


THE   END 


INDEX 


Abthugni,  Felix  of,  312,  313,  320 
Academics,  the,  161,  225 
Achilles,  42 

Adeodatus,  son  of  St.  Augustin, 
121,  184 

—  at  Cassicium,  218,  224 

—  at  Ostia,  237 

—  enters  St.  Augustin's  mon- 
astery, 243,  247 

—  his  baptism,  229 

—  his  death,  231,  386 
.■Eolian  Isles,  the,  241 
^sculapius,  77,  80 

Aetius,  defeats  the  Huns,  4,  374 
Africa,     St,     Augustin     as     an 

interpreter  of,  8 
Agapae,  custom  of  the,  27 
Agro  Romano,  the,  233-235 
•Aigues-Moi'tes,  283 
Alani,  the,  invade  Africa,  365- 

369 
Alaric,    invades    Italy,    4,     272, 

291,  333.  337-344.  365.  368 
Albicerius,  wizard,  123 
Albina,  Lady,  301 
Alexandria,  73,  81 

—  Serapeum,  291 
Algiers,  315 

Alypius,  his  baptism,  229 

—  enters  St.  Augustin's  mon- 
astery, 243 

—  his  friendship  with  St.  Au- 
gustin, 65,  97,  123,  125,  134, 
153-157,    161,    176,   181,    186, 

204-208,     218,     224,    2.]2,     26T, 
274, 372 

—  in  Rome,  154-157 
Ampelius,  Prefect,  149 
Anicii,  the,  340,  341 
Antioch,  73 

Antoninus,  baths  of,  82 
Atitony,  Life  of  Si.,  205 
Apollonius  of  Tyana,  53 

2  C  ■ 


Apuleius,     compared     with     St. 
Augustin,  274 

—  in  Madaura,  52,  53,  131 

—  in  Milan,  199 

—  on  paganism,  352 

—  statue  of,  52,  80 

Aquileia,  Valentinian  II  at,  231 
Arabs,  the,  invasion  bj^  282 

—  orgies  of,  351 
Aratus  of  Sicyon,  350 
Arcadius,  85 
Ariadne,  story  of,  59 
Arianism,  in  Africa,  88 

—  in  Milan,  164 

—  St.     Augustin's    attacks    en, 

.^04.  365.  373.  382 
Aristotle,  his  Ten  Categories,  124 
Aries,  Council  of,  313 
Astrology,  discussed  by  St. 

Augustin,  127 
Athletes  of  Christ,  the,  309 
Atlas,  Mount,  327,  367 
Audax,  302 

Avu-elius,  Bishop  of  Carthage,  36 
supports     St.     Augustin, 

260,  265,  274,  310,  323 
Aures,  the,  15,  22,  49 

Bacchus,  festivals  of,  55 
Bagai,  Bishop  of,  22 

—  Council  of,  271 

—  Donatists  at,  315,  321 
Baptism,   reasons  for  deferring, 

35.  43.  142,  184 
Barbarians,   the,  invade  Africa, 

365-369.  376,  378 

—  invade   Italy,    147,   150,   ig8, 
222,  291,  336,  358 

—  reconciled    with    the    Latins, 
4.6 

— ^  their  Arianism,  365,  373,  382 

Barnaby,  priest,  360 

Basilica,  the  Christian,  285,  294 

89 


;90 


INDEX 


Bethlehem,  St.  Jerome  of,  306 
Bible,  St.  Augustin  on  the,  102 
Bishops,  jurisdiction  of,  279 
Bona,  282,  315 
Boniface,    Count   of   .\frica,    his 

career,  370-380 
Bossuet,     compared     with     St. 

Augustin,  6 
Boujeiah,i5 
Brianza  range,  the,  213 
B)'zacena,  315 

Ca?cilianus,     Bishop,     312,     313, 

318,  320 
Caesarea  Mauretaniae,  41,  326-328 
Caligula,  Emperor,  349 
Campagna,  the  Italian,  15 
Caracalla,  Emperor,  147,  283 
Carthage,    Aurelius,    Bishop    of, 

260,  274,  310 

—  Ceecilianus,  Bishop  of,  312 

—  compared  v\-ith  Rome,  79-83, 
143-148 

—  Conference  at,  325,  327,  328, 
362 

—  Donatism  in,  315 

—  festivals  in,  86,  261,  351 

—  government  of,  83-85 

—  its  spiritual  supremacy,  8 

—  St.  Augustin  accused  of  fleeing 
from  prosecution  at,  135 

—  St.  Augustin  at,  2,  8,  20,  70- 
107, 120-137, 158.  241,  242,  364 

—  Virgil  on,  57,  77 
Cassicium,  St.  Augustin  at,  213- 

229,  244,  268 

—  St.  Monnica  at,  30 
Castinus,  Prefect,  373 
Cataqua,  Paulus,  Bishop  of,  274 
CathoHcism,    its    struggle    with 

Donatism,  22,  259,   271,  285, 
316-329 

—  threatened  by  Arianism,  365, 

377 
Catullus,  59,  60 
Cemeteries,  visitation  of,  27,  179, 

259 
Chalons,  4 
Cherchell,  41 

—  Emeritus,  Bishop  of,  326-329 

—  fall  of,  367 


Christianity,  fall  of  Rome  attri- 
buted to,  342 

—  its  political  position  in  Africa, 
21,  22,  33,  43,  55,  64,  68,  88 

Cicero,  his  Horteyisius,  99—102, 384 

—  St.  Augustin  on,  302 
Circoncelliones,    the,    309,    322, 

325,  366,  369 
Cirta,  46 

City  of  God,  The,  124, 129,345-359 
Claudian,  the  poet,  146,  181,  336 
Clitumnus,  the,  334 
Cock-fighting,  St.  Augustin    on, 

223 
Coelestis,  goddess,  81 
Como,  Lake  of,  298 
Constans,  Emperor,  147 
Constantine,  13 

—  Donatists  in,  311,  315,  318 

—  repulses  the  Barbarians,  367 
Constantine,  Emperor,  21,  333 

■ Donatism  under,  312,  313 

Constantinople,  73,  151,  291 
Constantius,  Emperor,  21 

j  Cordova,  2 85 

j  Corsica,  338 
Corvbants,  castrated  priests   of 

I       Cybele,  88,  352 

i  Crispinus,  Bishop,  321 

I  Damascus,  285 

j  Damasus,  Pope,  169 

I  Damous-el-Karita,  82 

Dante,  201 

Dares  the  Phrygian,  57 

Darius,    Count,    his    mission    of 
peace,  378,  384 

Decurions,  the,  18,  19,  55,  83,  iii' 

Demetrius  of  Pharos,  350 

Demiurgus,  194 

Deuterius,  Bishop  of  Mauretania, 
327,  328 

Dictys  of  Crete,  57 

Dido,  Queen  of  Carthage,  58 

Diocletian,  baths  of,  147 

—  persecutions  of,  311 
Dioscorus,  302 
Donatists,   the,   history  of  their 

sect,  31 1-3 1 6 

—  in  Africa,  21-23,  43'  68,  88, 
178,  253,  259,  261,  271,  370 


/ 


INDEX 


391 


Donatists 

—  on  St.  Augustin,  73,  134,  266, 
267 

—  St.  Augustin's  crusade  against, 
270,  285,  290,  305,  308-311, 
316-329,344,367,370-372,382 

Donatus,  organizes  the  sect,  313 

—  St.  Augustin  on,  2,  14 
Drunkenness  and  felicity,  189 

Ecclesiastes,  quoted,  370 

Eclanum,  Julian  of.  365 

Edough,  the,  256,  257 

Emeritus,  Bishop  of  Cherchell, 
326-329 

Epicurean  tendencies,  St.  Augus- 
tin's, 268 

Eschmoum,  80 

Eugenius,  usurper,  272 

Eulogius,  pupil  of  St.  Augustin, 
123,  242 

Evodius,  Bishop  of  Uzalis,  at 
Ostia,  236,  238,  242 

becomes  a  monk,  243,  274 

his  baptism,  229 

his     friendship     with     St. 

Augustin,  156,  229,  242,  358 

Faustus,  Bishop,  132,  160,  170 
ipelix  of  Abthugni,  312,  313,  320 
Figes,  358 

Firmus  the  Moor,  85,  367,  369 
Flaminian  Way,  the,  334 
Fortunatus,  Donatist  priest,  259, 

319,  360 
France,   its  history  involved  in 

that  of  Rome,  4 
Fronto,  M.  Cornelius,  46 

Gargilius,  baths  of,  82 
Genethlius ,  Bishop  of  Carthage ,  88 
Genseric,    King,   invades  Africa, 

367.  376,  378 
Gibraltar,  Straits  of,  367 
Gildo,  Count,  his  government  of 

Carthage,  271,  272,  369 
Gospel  of  St.  Matthew,  quoted, 

376 

—  of  St.  John,  194 

—  of  St.  Mark,  38 

Goths,  the,  threaten  Africa,  365, 
37S,  386 


Gratian,  Emperor,  167,  168 
Greek      civilization,      compared 
with  Latin,  6 

—  language,  St.  Augustin's  dis- . 
like  of  the,  44,  57 

Guelma,    Bishops   of,    254,    265, 

274.  321,  370 

—  paganism  at,  344 

Hannibal,  42 
Hector,  42 
Flelpidius,  157 
Heraclianus,  Count,  340 
Heraclius,     named     Bishop     of 

Hippo,  360-363 
Hermes  Criophorus,  217 
Hierius,  Syrian  orator,  128,  129, 

134 
Hippo,  15,  47,  48 

—  Heraclius  chosen  as  Bishop  of, 
360-363 

—  Leontius,  Bishop  of,  286 

—  siege  of,  369,  376-383 

—  St.  Augustin  as  Bishop  of,  20, 
27,  63,  128,  267-329,  360,  371 

—  St.  Augustin's  life  as  a  priest 
in,  255-267,  384 

—  St.  Augustin's  ordination  at, 
247,  252-254 

—  the  Anicii  at,  341 

—  Valerius,  Bishop  of,  252-255 
Homer,  57 

Honoratus,  Bishop,  his  friend- 
ship with  St.  Augustin,  97,  125, 

1.34.  377 

Honorius,  Emperor,  his  pro- 
mulgations against  the  Donat- 
ists, 286,  301,  325,  370 

withstands  Alaric, 4,  272, 333 

visits  Rome,  333-336 

his  character,  335 

Horace,  117 

Huns,  the  defeat  of,  4 

Ilissus,  the,  225 

Innocentius,  lawyer,  liis  miracu- 
lous cure,  242 

Intellectuals,  the,  187 

Isaiah,  St.  Augustin  counselled 
to  read  by  St.  Ambrose,  229 

Islamism  in  Africa,  64 

Ithomcca,  the,  350 


•92 


INDEX 


Jansenists,     the,     identify     the 

saint  with  their  cause,  i,  251 
Jerusalem,  earthquake  at,  291 
Jews,  St.  Augustin  on  the,  306 
John,  Bisliop  of  Jerusalem,  291 
Julian  of  Eclanum,  365 
Julian  the  Apostate,    Emperor, 

43,  68,  126,  149,  347 
Juliana,  Lady,  301 
Justina,  Empress,  167,  19S 
Justinian,  Emperor,  2S3 

Karnak,  51 

Lamartine,  257 

Lambesa,  52 

Lastidianus  follows  St.  Augustin, 
176,  219,  236 

Latin  genius  reconciled  with 
Barbarian,  6 

La  Villette,  348 

Lazarus,  priest,  360 

Licentius,  pupil  of  St.  Augustin, 
123,  125,  212,  213,  219-229,  244 

Leonardo  da  Vinci,  214 

Leontius,  Bishop  of  Hippo,  286 

Leporius,  priest,  360 

Literature,  St.  Augustin  on,  96, 
226,  245,  246 

Love -potion,  St.  Augustin  ac- 
cused of  giving  a,  267 

Lower-Empire,  the,  4,  225 

Lucian,  on  Rome,  147 

Lucilla,  Spanish  Donatist,  312 

Luxor,  51 

Macedon,  King  Philip  of,  350 
Madame  Bovary,  274 
Madaura,  15 

—  St.  Augustin  in,  46-62,  74, 
79,  105,  274 

Majorinus,  Bishop,  313 
Manicheeism,  in  Africa,  89,  247 

—  St.  Augustin's  adherence  to, 
102-104,  108-110,  113-116, 
124-127,  131-134.  141.  153- 
164,  170,  192 

—  St.  Augustin's  attacks  on, 
240,  247.  259,  266,  304 

Manlius  Thcodorus,  181 
Marcellinus,  Ammianus,  274 

—  tribune,  325,  326 


Marcianus,  his  friendship  with 
St.  Augustin,  125,  134,  137, 
138.  164 

Marcus  Aurelius,  Emperor,  348 

—  his  tutor,  46 
Marius,  victories  of,  4 
Mars,  statues  of,  52 
Martinianus,  360 
Mauretania,  85,  151,  315 

—  bishopric  of,  327 
Maxima,  Lady,  301 
Maximianiis,  Bishop,  stabbed  by 

Donatists,  321 
Maximinus,  Prefect,  151,274,  315 
Maximus,   his  letter  to  St.  Au- 
gustin, 56 
■ —  invades  Italy,  230,  240 
Medjerda,  the,  13,  48 
Megalius,     Bishop    of    Guelma, 

265-267 
Menander,  78 
Mensurius,  Bishop,  312 
Messianus,  Proconsul,  135 
Milan,    community   of   St.    Am- 
brose in,  229,  243 

—  Imperial  Court  at,  145,  164, 
181,  198,  273,  333 

—  St.  Augustin  in,  3,  97,  107, 
162-212,  229,  244,  269, 273, 386 

Milevia,  Severus,  Bishop  of,  243 

Mithras,  88 

Moloch,  worship  of,  81 

Mount  Atlas,  14 

Mount  Berecyntus,  87 

Mount  Bj'^rsa,  77,  80,  152 

Mulvius  bridge,  the,  334 

Music,    St.    Augustin's   lo\-e   of, 

244-246 
Muslemism,  20 
Musset,  Alfred  dc,  75 

Naples,  bay  of,  257 
Narnia,  the,  334 
Navigius,  brotherof  St.  Augustin, 
at  Cassicium,  219 

—  at  Milan,  23,  176 

—  at  Ostia,  236 

Nebridius,  his  friendship  with 
St.  Augustin,  97,  125,  127, 
176,  181,  187,  212,  248,  274 

Necromancy,  pi-actice  of,  53,  126 


INDEX 


393 


Nectarius  of  Guelma,  St.  Augus- 

tin's  attack  on,  274 
Nero,  Emperor,  146 
Nice,  Council  of,  265,  362 
Nimes,  283 
Nola,  St.  Paulinus  of,  156,  219, 

248,  302 
Numatianus,  Rutilius,  257 
Numidia,  Barbarians  invade,  376 

—  Council  of,  362 

—  diversities  of,   14-16,  49,  250 

—  Donatists  in,  271,  309-317 

—  Megalius,  Primate  of,  265,  267 

Olympius,     counselled     by     St. 

Augustin,  301 
Optatus  of  Thimgad,   271,   272, 

275 
Orestes,  120 
Ostia,  83 

—  SS.  Augustin  and  Monnica  at, 
146,  177,  230-241 

Ovid,  59 

—  his  Art  of  Love,  351 

Paganism  in  Carthage,  343 

—  its  political  position  in  Africa, 
2i>  35.  43.  55.  64,  68,  88,  126 

—  St.    Augustin's    attitude    to, 
217,  220,  345 

Paris,  73 

Parmenianus,  Bishop,  88 

Pascal,  Blaise,  i,  191,  218 

—  his  Pensees  quoted,  33 
Patricius,  father  of  St.  Augustin, 

112,  177 

—  his  character  and  career,  18- 
30,  43,  46,  62,  66-70 

—  his  death,  91,  237 
Paulinus  of  Nola,  St.,  156,  219, 

248,  302 
Paulus,  Bishop  of  Cataqua,  274 
Pelagianism,   St.   Augustin's  at- 
tacks on,  305,  365,  366 
Peloponnesus,  the,  272 
Persius,  quoted,  354 
Pertinax,  career  of,  46 
Petilian,  a  Donatist,  267 
Pharos,  Demetrius  of,  350 
Philip  of  Macedon,  King,  350 
Pinian,  341 


Placidia,  Empress,  374 
Plato,  Dialogues  of,  193 
Platonism,   St.    Augustin's  atti- 
tude towards,    113,   193,   203, 

354.  356 
Plautus,  59 
Plutarch,  on  Philip  of  Macedon, 

350 
Pollentia,  battle  of,  333,  336 
Pompeii,  215 
Pompey,  147 
Pontitianus,  204-206 
Populace,   Roman,    customs  of, 

149-152 
Porphyry,  philosopher,  336 
Port  Royal,  philosophers  of,    i, 

33.  251 
Possidius,  Bishop  of  Guelma,  on 

St.   Augustin,    254,    258,    370, 

378,  384,  386,  387 

attacked  by  Donatists,  321 

Praetextatus,  Prefect,  i6g 
Primanius,  Donatist  primate,  319 
Proba,  Lady,  301 
Proculeianus,     Bishop     of     the 

Donatists,  271,  309,  318 
Propertius,  59 
Psalms,  quoted,  passim 
Pylades,  120 
Pyramus  andThisbe,  story  of,  220 

Racine,  St.  Augustin  compared 

with,  119 
Radagaisus,  invades  Italy,  365 
Ravenna,  Imperial  Court  at,  4, 

333.  334.  337.  371.  374>  378 
Religianus,  360 
Renan,  201 

Restitutus,  murder  of,  326 
Rhetoric,  St.  Augustin's  love  of, 

96 
Rhodes,  77 
Rogatists,  the,  315 
Rogatus,  Bishop  of  Tenes,  89 
Roman  Empire,  the,  architecture 

of,  54,  79.  146 

—  fall  of ,  3,  4,  150,  198,  272,  291, 
382 

—  its  greatness,  84 

—  its  occupation  of  Africa,  315, 
370 


;94 


INDEX 


Romanianus,  his  patronage  of  St. 
Augustin,  70,  74,  91,  96,  106, 
110-114, 120,123,145, 181, 188, 
197,  212,  219,  248,  249,  298 

Romanticism,  sympathy  of  St. 
Augustin  with,  6,  119 

Romanus,  Count,  68 

Rome,  73,  77 

—  compared  with  Carthage,  79- 

83.  143-152 

—  Council  of,  313 

—  Hierius,  orator  to  the,  128 

—  Honorius  in,  334-336 

—  its  African  suppUes,  368 
• —  Lateran  Museum,  223 

—  massacres  in,  349 

—  Ostia,  the  port  of,  231,  234 

—  ruins  of,  282 

—  sack  of,  291,  333,  338-344 

—  St.  Augustin  in,  3,  107,  133, 
141-164,  240-243 

—  St.  Peter's,  260 
Rufinus,  85 

Rusticus,  follows  St.  Augustin, 
176,  219,  236 

Sahara,  the,  15,  51 

Sainte-Beuve,  quoted,  117,  345 

Sallust,  143,  152 

Samsucius,  Bishop  of  Tours,  274 

Sapida,  303 

Sardinia,  338 

Saturnius,  priest,  360 

Scheffer,  Ary,  his  picture  of 
SB.  Augustin  and  Monnica, 
232,  233 

Scipio  Africanus,  42 

Secundus,  Bishop,  318 

Septimus  Severus,  Arches  of, 
146,  283,  336 

Septuagint,  307 

Serapis,  88 

Setif,  13,  14 

Severus,  Bishop  of  Milevia,  be- 
comes a  monk,  243,  274 

Seybouse  valley,  the,  256 

Sicily,  338 

Sicyon,  Aratus  of,  350 

Sigisvultus,  376 

Simitthu,  marble  of,  13 

Simplicianus,  203 


Slander,  St.  Augustin  on,  258 
Socrates,  method  of,  225 
Sossius,  baths  of,  259 
Souk-Ahras,  15,  18 
St.  Ambrose,  Bishop  of  Milan,  156 

advises  St.  Augustin,  229 

his  attitude  to  St.  Augustin. 

165-167,  171-174,  191 
his  authority  and  position 

in   Milan,    167-175,    180,    200, 

-59 
•  his    community    in    Milan, 

229 

his  hymns,  200,  239,  386 

on  sacrifice  to  idols,  349 

St.  Antony,  the  hermit,  204,  205 
St.  Augustin,  his  career  reviewed, 

1-9 

—  his  Confessions,  i,  31,  loi,  304 
their    significance,    32—34, 

37.  50.  63.  304 

quoted,  91,  155,   172,   174, 

190 

—  as  a  teacher,  7 

—  as  an  African,  8,  15,  23,  35,  41, 

50 

—  his  birth,  31-34 

—  his  childhood,  34-44,  346 

—  his  schooldays,  44-58 

—  his  experiences  of  love,  59-61, 
76,  93,  119,  385 

—  his  licentious  life  at  Thagaste, 
62 

—  his  relations  with  his  mother, 

69.  91,  135.  233 

—  his  life  in  Carthage,  73-105 

—  as  a  rhetorician,  96,  105,  115, 
138 

—  studies  Cicero,  99-102 

—  his  adherence  to  Manichee- 
ism,  102-116,  124-127,  131- 
134.  14^.  153-164,  170,  192 

—  teaches  in  Thagaste,  105-120 

—  his  connection  with  his  mis- 
tress, 107,  121-124,  133,  134, 
153,  176,  183-186 

—  his  Retractations,  107,  120,  305 

—  is  forbidden  his  home  and 
lives  with  Romanianus,  no 

—  his  mother  prays  and  weeps 
for  him,  115,  136,  163,  178,  207 


INDEX 


395 


St.  Augustin 

—  teaches  in  Carthage,  121-135 

—  his  son's  birth,  121 

—  his  The  City  of  God,  124,  129, 

345-359 

—  his  Upon  the  Beautiful  and  the 
Fit,  128,  134 

—  his  poor  health,  130,  180,  199, 
211,  286 

—  visits  Rome,  133-163,  240 

—  his   friendship   with   Alypius, 

153 

—  his  power  of  ridicule,  157 

—  as    professor    of    Rhetoric    in 
Milan,  162-212 

—  his    relations    with    St.    Am- 
brose, 165-175 

—  studies   Plato   and   St.    Paul, 
194,  203,  204 

—  his  love  of  music,  201 

—  his  conversion,  207 

—  his  life  at  Cassicium,  212-229 

—  his  attitude  to  paganism,  217, 
220,  345 

—  his  Dialogues,  219,  225-227 

—  his  Soliloquies,  228 

—  his  baptism,  229 

—  his    life    at    Ostia    and    St. 
Monnica's  death,  230-241 

—  his  attacks  on  Manicheeism, 
240,  247,  259,  266,  304 

- — returns     to     Carthage,     241, 
242 

—  his  monastic  life  at  Thagaste, 
243-252 

—  his  school  treatises,  244,  304 

—  his  The  Master,  247 

—  his  son's  death,  251 

—  is    lured    to    Hippo,    and    or- 
dained priest,  252-261 

—  establishes  a  monastery,  255- 
260,  265 

—  is  consecrated  Bishop  of  Hippo, 
265 

—  his  work  as  bishop,  267,  295- 

307 

—  his   sermons   at   Hippo,    273, 
276,  282,  287-294 

—  his  decisions  among  litigants, 
280,  295 

—  his  letters,  301-303 


for    the 


the 
see 


St.  Augustin 

—  his  discussion  with  St. 
Jerome,  306 

—  his    broad    outlook 
Church,  316 

—  his  campaign  against 
Barbarians,  343-359.  369 
also  The  City  of  God 

—  appoints     Heraclius     as     his 
successor,  360-364 

—  attacks  Arianism  and  Pelagi- 
anism,  365 

— -  his  appeal  to  Count  Boniface, 

370-378 

—  his  illness  and  death  in  the 
besieged  city,  379-387 

St.  Crispina,  feast  of,  289 
St.  Cyprian,  313 

—  tomb  of,  261 

St.  Francis  of  Assisi,  107 
Stilicho,  regent  of  Honorius,  272, 

333-335 
St.  Jerome,  161,  258 

—  St.  Augustin's  discussion  with, 
306,  307 

St.  John,  7 

St.  Laurence,  45 

St.  Lewis  of  France,  117 

St.  Melania,  341 

St.  Monnica,  9 

—  as  a  wife,  ig,  22,  26-30 

—  her  girlhood,  23-26 

—  as  a  mother,  26,  31,  34,  43, 
45.  56,  67-70,  91,  106,  346 

—  effect  of  her  austerity  on  her 
son,  iog-114 

—  her  dream  of  her  son,  114 

— weeps  for  her  son,    115-117, 

135-137 

—  effects  her  son's   conversion, 
142,  163,  177-180,  207 

—  in  Milan,  176-180,  183 

—  at  Cassicium,  218-224 

—  her    ecstasy    and    death    at 
Ostia,  231-240 

St.  Paul,  7,  279 

—  his  Epistles,  194,  204,  207,  306 
St.  Paulinus  of  Nola,   156,  219, 

248,  302 
St.  Sebastian,  45 
Stromboli,  241 


196 


INDEX 


Style,  St.  Augustin's,  248 
Suffetula,  343 
Sylla,  victories  of,  4 
Symmachus,   Prefect,  compared 
with  St.  Augustin,  274 

in  Carthage,  85,  163 

in  Rome,  151,  162,  166,  168 

Syphax,  King,  51 

Tanit,  49,  76 
Tebessa,  283 
Tenes,  Bishop  of,  89 
Terence,  59,  78,  137,  164 
Tertullian,  88,  131 

—  quoted,  349,  356 
Tertullus,  Consul,  344 
Thagaste,  237 

—  as  a  market-town,  15-17 

—  early  life  of  St.  Augustin  at, 
2,  8,  13-46,  62-70,  83,  105-120 

—  landscape  of,  13-15,  48-51, 
197 

—  St.  Augustin's  life  as  a  monk 
at,  242-252,  255 

Thagura,  15 

Theatre,  St.  Augustin  writes  for 
the,  127-128 

Theodorus,  I\Ianlius,  298 

Theodosius,  Emperor,  his  reign 
and  policy,  134,  153,  167,  240, 
271,  272,  280,  335,  343 

Theodosius,  Consul,  360 

Theodosius,  Count,  85 

Theveste,  15,  47,  48,  52 

—  ruins  of,  282-285 
Thimgad,  16,  52 

—  Donatisni  in,  315 

—  Optatus  of,  271,  272,  275 
Thubunas,  372 
Thubursicum,  15,  16 

—  St.  Augustin  at,  319 

Tiber,  the  river,  231,  233.  334-338 

Tibullus,  59 

Tours,  Samsucius,  Bisliop  of,  274 


Treves,  205 

Trinity,  the  Holy,  St.  Augustin's 

treatise  on,  306 
Tripolitana  Regio,  the,  315 
Trygetius,  pupil  of  St.  Augustin, 

212,  219,  222—229 
Tunis,  315 
—  Lake  of,  77,  152 
Tyana,  53 
Tyconius,  89 

Utica,  St.  Augustin  at,  364 
Uzalis,  Evodius,  Bishop  of,  229, 
358 

Valentinian    II,    Emperor,    167, 

168,  231,  272,  360 
Valentinianus,  Emperor,  68,  85, 

151,  199 

his  man-eating  bears,  199 

Valerius,  Bishop  of  Hippo,  252- 

255.   259.   260,   265-267,   271, 

275.  362 
Vandals,     the,     invade     Africa, 

365-369,  376 
Varro,  on  paganism,  346,  347,356 
Verecundus,      grammarian,     his 

friendship  with  St.  Augustin, 

212-218 
Veronese,  Paolo,  214 
Vestals,  the,  168 
Victorinus  Afer,  46,  193,  203,  211 
Vigil  of  Venus,  quoted,  60 
Villas,  African,  112 
Vindicianus,  Pi-oconsul,  127,  131, 

166 
Virgil,  St.  Augustin's  love  of,  57, 

77,  119,  216,  222 

"Wreckers,  The"  (Carthage  stu- 
dents), 92,  130 

Zaghouan,  the  river,  82 
Zozimus,  Pope,  327 


WILLIAM   BRENDON   AND  SON,   LTD, 
I'RINTERS,    I'LVMOUTH 


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